


Too Fast Too Furious Times at Ridgemont High

by Devilc



Category: The Fast and the Furious
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - High School, Car Sex, Closeted Character, First Time, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-06
Updated: 2010-01-06
Packaged: 2017-10-05 22:10:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 9
Words: 30,406
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/46512
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Devilc/pseuds/Devilc
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A TF&TF High School AU.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> A TF&amp;TF High School AU inspired by an onlist challange. Thanks to Dawn and Bone for the beta. Thanks to Khalesian for additional helpful commentary.
> 
> Posted in loving memory of labgirl2076. 

With a heavy sigh Brian O'Connor flopped on to his bed, picked up the remote, and turned on the TV, hoping for something good on. Click. Click. Click. Nope. Nothing. Antenna sucked.

Fuck. He missed Rome.

Mom had just closed the mortgage on the house Friday and they had spent all weekend hauling their stuff out of storage and the extended stay suite where they had lived the past two weeks. School began in one week and he didn't know a single fucking person. Talk about a crappy way to begin a Junior year. But Blue Sun had made Mom the offer of a lifetime, which explained just how he had ended up in Echo shitsucking Park.

God, he missed Rome.

Shit. He even missed Barstow and _that_ was saying something.

Cursing under his breath he leapt off the bed. He still had a lot of boxes to unpack, and he might as well get his iMac up and running so that when the phone company came to turn on the phones and (hopefully) get the DSL going, he could e-mail Rome .

He really ached for Rome at slack times like this. And Mom had made it pretty damn clear that she did not approve of Rome , at least not any more. First off, he came from a family where "they work with their hands" and second off, she thought Brian was "too attached" to Rome . He even played the wrong kind of sport -- baseball. Arrrgh. She just didn't get it. Everything, even the boring things, was better with Rome . They bailed each other out of trouble. They got each other into trouble. Rome was like his brother ... only of a different color and from a different mother.

Brian suspected his mother thought they had fooled around. Which, okay, they had. Hell, she had almost caught them once. But that was just two guys blowing off steam. He liked girls. Liked them fine.

It was perfectly natural for guys to want a little ease. Especially between girlfriends.

(So what if he'd come harder from Rome 's hand on his dick than he'd ever come when fooling around with a girl. And sometimes, beating off, he thought about Rome or other guys at school. He didn't mean to -- they just popped into his head.)

Just guys being guys. That's all it was. But try explaining that to a mom.

Perfectly natural.

Period.

**~oo(0)oo~ **

Brian had gotten the really important things like the iMac, stereo, and the PS2 unpacked and going when he heard the sound of car in the driveway. It didn't sound like Mom's Acura, and he really didn't feel like dealing with anybody right now so he decided to take the "nobody's home" approach to whoever it was at the door, so he started in surprise when it opened.

"Brian ..." his mom yelled up the stairs.

"Yeah?" he shouted back.

"Come downstairs, please."

"Gimme a minute." God, what could she want now? He set the hammer aside only after driving the last nail in his favorite David Beckham poster, and clomped down the stairs.

His mom was trying to keep a poker face. She sucked completely. Her face might appear completely wooden, but she couldn't keep the smile from sparkling in her eyes.

What was _she_ so happy about? Oh yeah, her great new job. What did he have to smile about? Jack and shit.

"Sweetie, you need to put some shoes on."

"What for?"

She couldn't keep her secret any longer. "You'll need to give me a ride back to the dealership -- in your new car!" she gushed.

"What?! Mom! OhMyGod!" Brian sprinted out the door.

In the driveway sat a little red Toyota MR2 T-Top. Brian loved it. It looked like a baby Ferrari.

"God, Mom!" Brian's voice jumped several octaves. "You didn't!"

"Oh yes I did, baby," she said proudly. "1994 MR2 turbo. And only 75,000 miles on it."

This could not be happening. Mom had gotten him a car.

A car he had lusted after for years.

A cool car.

He ... he could drive to Barstow and hang with Rome . Like, even this weekend.

His mother's laughing voice cut in. "Earth to Brian. Put your shoes on so you can drive me back to the dealer so I can pick up my car."

**~oo(0)oo~ **

The car came with about three million strings attached.

No speeding. As soon as he got a ticket, he had to start paying his own insurance.

If his grades dropped below a B average, it would be taken away.

No road trips. At least not until the first semester was over. And if Brian thought he would just sneak over, she would sell the car if she found out.

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

**~oo(0)oo~ **

Brian felt weirdly calm and excited as he pulled into Ridgemont High. He already knew were everything was, mostly because he had gone to an orientation session on Friday. However, that meant that the only people he had met so far were mostly Freshmen. He had happened to bump into the soccer coach, though, so that was cool.

He had just locked the door and set the alarm when three cars pulled in and parked bam, bam, bam, in a row in the reserved spaces. A red Civic coupe with a serious wing on the back, lowered, but not ghetto. A late 1980s Camaro, blue, with louvers over the rear window and a seriously oxidized paint job. And a classic Mustang, orange mostly, but with areas of primer. The license plate said 67STANG. It had "project car" written all over it.

Three guys with "jock" stamped all over them climbed out of the cars. Two of them were built like pit bulls; one of them even shaved his head. Their friend in the Mustang had a leaner frame, but still had some serious muscle. Brian pegged them for football players or wrestlers.

But then this girl, this goddess, climbed out of the passenger side of the Civic. She was tall and willowy, but not a stork, and long shiny brown hair curled around her shoulders. And she smiled, and ...

... and with a brother as big as that, Brian was not going to go over and say hi, even though he knew he was in her league.

The "Camaro dood" jogged over to her side and even from a split second glance Brian could see that he wanted to be her boyfriend in the worst way, but that she was _so_ not into him.

He glanced down at his watch. Shit. He needed to find D-47. Algebra. Not exactly his favorite subject.

**~oo(0)oo~ **

Her name was Mia. Mia Toretto. They had biology together. She seemed nice.

**~oo(0)oo~ **

After classes had finished for the day, Brian headed down to the field. CIF rules stated that soccer practice couldn't start until next quarter, but, as Coach Prince pointed out, the CIF couldn't do anything about soccer enthusiasts getting in a quick pick-up game on the field an hour before football practice started.

Brian also figured that it couldn't hurt to get to know a few of the players before tryouts for the team began. Back in Barstow , he had been a big fish in a little pond -- okay, a whale in a bathtub -- but there were a lot more students at Ridgemont, and some of the Hispanic guys had probably started kicking a soccer ball as soon as they could run.

The minute he stepped on the field, Brian noticed that he was _the_ white guy. Ridgemont was roughly 1/3 white, 1/3 Hispanic, and then the rest Asian and black, but almost everybody on this field was Latino. He stopped uncertainly.

"Hey, Beto, check out the snowman!" one the Latinos called out good-naturedly. He jogged over to Brian and held out his hand. "Name's Hector. I got a last name but I can't pronounce it."

Brian liked the stocky fellow immediately. "I'm Brian O'Connor."

Hector froze for a spit second. "You from Barstow , man?"

"Uh, yeah. Why?"

Hector shook his head in mock sorrow. "Oh man, we were almost blood enemies, y'know. My Uncle Armando, he holds the division III record for most goals scored in a season. You finished only one goal below him last season and you were a sophomore. Mondo is real proud of that record. It's over 10 years old and nobody has come close -- until you. But hey," Hector clapped Brian on the back and began walking towards the rest of the players, "You're division I now, so Mondo's got nothing to worry about."

Brian laughed. Yeah. Maybe Ridgemont wouldn't be so bad after all.

The short pick-up session broke up as soon as the football players began drifting onto the field. Brian quickly got Hector's phone number, and also an invite to the regular Saturday morning game down in the park as they made their way up into the gym enroute to the locker room.

Cheerleading tryouts were going on. Brian spotted Mia chatting with a few other girls.

"Man, you better be careful with Mia," Hector said, smiling.

"Dude, I know. I've seen her brother."

"No, it's not Dominic you have to worry about. He's a good guy and of course he looks out for his sister, but the guy you gotta look out for is Vince. He's a linebacker on the football team. Bad temper."

Brian thought for a moment. "He drive an older blue Camaro?"

"Yep."

Groan. "I saw him talking to her this morning. She's not interested."

Hector snickered. "Yeah. Now go tell him that."

**~oo(0)oo~ **

After they had cleaned up, Brian noticed Mia's brother, Dominic, sitting in the bleachers.

If his sister was a goddess, then he was a god. Striking face, but not classically so, like his sister's. Powerful muscles rippled across his body. The wife beater he had on concealed very little. Brian dragged his eyes up from the guy's pecs only to meet an intense pair of night black eyes.

Hector slung his arm over Brian's shoulder and walked him over. "Brian O'Connor, I'd like you to meet Dominic Toretto."

Dominic nodded a hello. Aloof. He watched the cheerleading tryouts with an intense look of concentration on his face -- not like most guys, who would've had seriously glazed eyes.

"Brian here is going to lead us to glory on the soccer field," Hector said.

Brian rolled his eyes and snorted at that. You were only as good as your team, especially the goalie. And Hector looked to be a damn good goalie.

"Dom here went to the state wrestling championships -- finished fourth."

Dominic glared at Hector, not really angry, just a bit annoyed.

"Anyhow," Hector continued, "Brian here is interested in Mia."

Dominic, to Brian's surprise, laughed at that. "Izzat right?" he asked, his voice a deep rumble, gravely, making Brian shiver (not unpleasantly) for some reason. "Soccer. That's a good thing. Means you probably got the stamina to outrun Vince."

Brian shrugged.

"Well, it looks like tryouts are over for the day," Dom said, and stood up. In a single powerful bound, he jumped over three rows of seats and landed on the gym floor. He sauntered, slightly pigeon toed, seemingly oblivious to all the girls around him, over to his sister and the two of them walked out the opposite side of the gym.

"Dude," Brian hissed, "are you trying to get me killed?"

Hector snorted, "Just letting Dom know to expect fireworks. He and I go way back. He's what you call good people."

**~oo(0)oo~ **

Brian got a better idea of what Dominic Toretto was like four days later at lunch.

When Mia had walked out of the bio lab, her wallet fell out of the back pocket of her backpack. As Brian picked it up, he called out to her, but she didn't hear him. He found her about 15 minutes later eating lunch with some friends at a picnic table.

"Uh, hey Mia, " (ohgod that sounded lame) "You dropped your wallet." She had looked at him and smiled when he called her name so the last bit came out in a bit of a rush.

Reflexively she patted her backpack, her magnificent hazel eyes growing large when she confirmed that it was, indeed, missing. "Ohmygod. Thank you. Thank you so much," she gasped in relief as she tucked it back in.

Half a second later, Brian found himself sitting with them. He had been hanging out with Hector and his homies for lunch the past few days, but given the choice between Hector and Mia ... dood, that wasn't a choice.

"Tuna on white, no crust." Mia laughed when she saw his lunch.

"What can I say," he shrugged, "I'm just a whiteboy representing."

She laughed. Brian had no idea what they talked about for the next minute or so. Back in Barstow he had been a star jock, and that, plus his looks, had guaranteed him any girl he wanted. There had been some _fine_ girls, but none of them held a candle to Mia.

A shadow fell between them. A voice, deceptively mild, said, "Mia. Who is this?"

Brian looked up to see Vince, the Camaro dood. The jealous glow in Vince's blue eyes and the menacing set of his brow belied the mild tone of his words. And this close to his body, Brian could see that he was very, very strong. Shit.

Mia huffed and replied, "Vince, this is Brian. He just moved here from Barstow ."

"That's nice," Vince drawled, crossing his arms and flexing his biceps before his voice turned really ugly. "Why don't you get up and go back to Barstow ?"

Right.

Brian shot to his feet and discovered that he had at least three inches on Vince. Staring down at him, Brian said, "I'll do that when you stop being a fucktard."

As soon as he said the words Brian wished he could take them back. Not because Vince didn't deserve it, or because he was afraid of Vince, but because he had overlooked the fact that he did not have Rome at his side, covering his back.

Bam! Pain exploded along his jaw line, and Brian found himself staggering back, the world gone curiously grey.

A split second later, something in him snapped.

Vince may have had 25 pounds of pure muscle on him, but Brian had weeks of pent up rage in him, plus, he hated bullies on principle.

The next thing Brian knew, he had Vince on the ground before him, and was about to deliver a richly deserved shitkicking, when Brian found himself slammed back into the table top, with a pissed off Dominic Toretto staring down at him.

The words froze in Brian's mouth as those black eyes bored into him.

"Vince started it, Dom!" Mia said.

"Blondie was sniffing around Mia!" Vince shouted back, picking himself up off the ground.

Dom rolled his eyes. Using one hand to keep Brian pinned to the table he whipped around, jabbed his finger under Vince's nose, and snapped, "Shut up! You embarrass me!"

Vince backed up, looking strangely shocked and hurt. He started to say something, but by that time several teachers had arrived and both Brian and Vince were hauled to the administration building.

**~oo(0)oo~ **

What a fucking way to start the school year.

A week of detention.

And it was all that ass Vince's fault, but did the vice-principal listen? Hell no. Not even when everybody said that Vince started it. Brian didn't see why he should be punished at all.

Oh, and Mom handled it equally well -- not! Brian tried again to explain that the other guy started it, but just like the vice principal, she wasn't hearing it. "Should have walked away" his ass. If he had tried that, Vince would have tackled him and beat the shit out of him, or equally bad, word would have gone around school that Brian was a wimpy faggot.

So, on top of detention, he was grounded until next Friday. No car. No going out on weekends. No staying out after dark. She didn't care that his birthday was just around the corner either, no going out with friends on the 12th. (As if Brian had made any yet). And worst of all, no phone, so no calling Rome to bitch about it. Shit, he was damn lucky to still have his computer and his bike. Brian suspected that the only reason that he still had his bike was because his mom didn't want to drive him to school.

With a groan, he fired off an email to Rome . Like that would do any good. Rome hadn't answered him in over a week.

Frustrated, Brian grabbed a spiral bound notebook and poured out everything onto a sheet of paper. Better, but not enough. He thought about just going ahead and calling Rome anyway, but then Brian realized he had at least another hour until his mom came home. Grabbing a handful of change, Brian stuffed it in his pocket and hopped on his bike in search of a pay phone.

**~oo(0)oo~ **

The sign above the market said Toretto's.

No. Fucking. Way. Brian thought as he duck walked the bike over to phone and plunked several coins in.

Rome 's little sister Tyreesha answered.

"Hey Reesha, is Rome there?"

Her nine-year-old giggly bubblyness vanished in an instant. "No, Bri. He's been sent up to Chino ."

Shock made Brian forget himself. "What the fuck did he do?"

"He and Benahe drank some 40s and then went joyriding."

"And?"

"Benahe didn't take his mom's car. He stole one."

"And Rome was stupid enough to climb in with him," Brian sighed, disgusted.

"Uh-huh."

Pause.

"Um. When you talk to Rome tell him I said, hi." He hung up and listened dejectedly as the coins plunked into place.

Benahe. What the fuck was Rome doing with that motherfucker? And because Brian wasn't there, he hadn't been able to stop Rome from tagging along with that stupid gang-banger wannabe buckethead. With a leaden heart Brian locked his bike to the rack and ventured in.

Mia was behind the counter by the soda fountain. Her face lit up when she saw him, which lifted Brian's spirits a little.

They plummeted a half second later when a blue Camaro and orange-grey Mustang pulled up.

"Hey, Mia, is Dom --" Vince's words cut off as soon as he saw Brian. "You!" he roared and darted forward, but the other guy, the one with the Mustang, lunged and grabbed him. "Let me go, Leon !"

"Nah, V, you need to chill." Leon had a low and raspy voice.

From the edge of the counter, Brian could see that Vince had a fading black eye. Funny. He didn't remember kicking Vince in the head. But suddenly he didn't feel quite so bad about the knot in his jaw.

Mia yelled, her voice cutting through the din of Vince and Leon scuffling, "Goddamnit, Vince, let it go! Just fucking let it go." Her bottom lip quivered and she looked upset enough to cry.

After a few minutes Vince relaxed and Leon let him go. Vince gave him a dirty look as he sat at the far end of the counter and Brian returned it.

Leon sat down between them, not saying anything, simply shooting both of them a warning look as he reseated his baseball cap and moved the toothpick from one side of his mouth to the other.

Vince broke the silence. "Mia ..."

She pointedly refused to look at him.

"Ahhh, come on, Mia, look at me, " Vince pleaded. When she sighed and relented, he continued, "I've known you since you were five years old. You're like a sister to me --" Leon gave an amused snort at that, but Vince ignored him and continued, "And I just don't want to see you get hurt is all."

Cold silence hung over the store for several moments. Finally Mia said, "Homecoming's in three weeks. Is there going to be an after game get together at PT's?"

Vince brightened. "Yeah!"

"Thought so." She turned to Brian and gave him a huge smile. "I want you to take me, Brian. Here's my number." Mia jotted it down on a napkin and pushed it across the counter to him. "Call me."

"I'm looking forward to it," Brian said and turned to leave.

"I love this part," Leon muttered under his breath. In a move so fast it left Brian's jaw gaping, Leon somehow slammed Vince face first into floor, got both of Vince's arms in some sort of an armlock, and then spun. The result was that Vince turned with him and ended up on his shoulders with his heels flipped over his head. He squeaked in impotent, purple faced rage.

"Hey, thanks, man," Brian said as he pushed the door open.

"Nah, dude, I'm not doing this for you. I'm just trying to keep old Wyle E. Coyote here from doing something really stupid," Leon rasped.

Yeah. Brian knew all about that -- trying to keep a friend from being stupid. He gave Leon a short, sharp nod, smiled and waived goodbye to Mia, unlocked his bike, and pedaled like the wind.


	2. Chapter 2

Unfortunately Brian did not beat his mother home. She got all set to go vesuvial on him, but Brian saved himself by happily blurting out, "But Mom, I got her number!"

"Who -- her?"

"That fight I got in? The girl, Mia, works in a store a few blocks over, not far from the park. I biked over to get some Twinkies and ... I got her number." Brian could tell he had a grin a mile wide on his face.

His mom's features softened a bit and after a minute she smiled. "That's good. What's she like? And maybe without Rome as your shadow, you'll get a chance to really know her."

Brian let the dig at Rome slide as he launched into a description of Mia. He only hoped he didn't sound like a huge dork. But, then again, if your mom couldn't cut you some slack for acting like a dork, who could?

**~oo(0)oo~**

Three weeks later as Brian sat with Mia and several of her friends celebrating the homecoming victory at PT's, a popular local hangout, he tried to ignore the feeling that something was missing.

Not surprisingly Vince and Leon had not joined them, and neither had Mia's brother, Dom.

Brian kissed a bit of pizza sauce off the edge of Mia's lip. She was the perfect girl. She was as beautiful as she was smart, and he felt as happy with her as he had felt with any other girl. He just thought that being in love was supposed to feel different ... more exciting somehow.

The house was dark when he pulled up. She hinted that it would be okay for him to come in, but Brian said that, nah, he'd just take it slow and avoid any ugliness. She nodded and kissed him. He put his arms around her and held her close for long moments, liking the feel of her body against his, and the way her mouth still tasted faintly of garlic and pizza sauce. It felt so good and so right.

(But not the same as it felt to have Rome sagging against him.)

**~oo(0)oo~ **

The Saturday morning pickup game in the park had been great, as usual, Brian thought as he pedaled away, cleats slung around his neck.

That first game, however, had been the most memorable. Hector took great pride in introducing him to anybody who didn't know him from school as "the snowman who almost took Mondo's record." Which meant that Brian got his fair share of hazing from everybody else -- mostly members of Hector's very extended family. But Brian didn't mind much because it was good natured, and as soon as he had shown what he could do, the respect followed.

Brian thought about stopping by Toretto's to see if Mia was working today, but then he figured that it was a little -- okay a lot -- on the gross side to show up all drenched in sweat, even if he could use something ice cold to drink.

About a block from where the way home diverged from the road to Toretto's, he saw a black Honda convertible swerve in front of a kid on a skateboard, causing the rider to crash.

What a shithead, Brian thought, and probably would have kept on going, except the driver of the Honda, a large twenty something Asian guy, got out in such a way which made it crystal clear that he had no intent of helping the skateboarder.

Brian coasted on over. "Hey, are you okay?" he asked. "I saw everything." He held out a hand to help the kid up.

"Yeah, I'm fine," the kid squeaked. He had a large scrape on his cheek, which he swiped at with equally skinned hands. The kid wasn't crying per-se, but his grey eyes swam with unshed tears of pain.

"Junior's fine. Now leave."

The venom in the voice shocked Brian as he pulled the kid up to stand behind him. Looking the driver in the eye -- they were easily the same height -- Brian said , "Look, man, I don't want any problems. Get in the car now and we'll pretend this never happened."

The guy scowled as he thought about it, then, with a black look at the two of them, climbed back in his car. "This isn't over yet, Jesse," he snarled, "you just got lucky today is all." He gunned the engine and roared off.

"Yeah, well, fuck you, Johnny!" the kid shouted. Despite his furious blinking, some tears had escaped -- two trails of clean wetness ran through the dirt on his face.

"Uh. I'm Brian."

"Jesse." His voice cracked.

"Where you headed?"

"Home."

"Call me a boy scout, but I'm going to walk with you and make sure that asshole doesn't finish what he started."

Jesse nodded in agreement, his eyes full of fear and anger underneath his stalwart show of bravado.

After a block or so, Brian said casually, "So, can you tell me what that's about?"

In a tight, angry voice, Jesse replied, "He had a fight with my dad."

Brian nodded, digesting that tidbit and then said, "Well, I can't wait to tell your dad what that ass did just now."

"You can't," Jesse snapped. "He's in jail."

Ouch. Sore subject.

"I know how you feel. My best friend just got sent to juvie out in Chino . I miss him a lot."

Jesse nodded. "And you can't tell my mom, neither. Dad and I haven't seen her in years." Cutting Brian's next question off, he said, "I'm staying with friends."

Two more blocks and then they turned. Brian recognized the street that Mia lived on. He wrestled with the idea of going to see if she was home (and getting a drink of water). Perhaps he could get one with Jesse's guardians. "Hey, Jesse, just curious. How old are you?"

"I'm 14 in two weeks."

Brian's opinion of Johnny, low to begin with, hit rock bottom and started digging. A 13 year old kid, for crying out loud. And it wasn't like Jesse was big for his age.

"School sucks," said Jesse out of nowhere, "except for math."

Brian had to laugh. "See, I'm of the exact opposite opinion. I think Algebra is the first form of Mid-East terrorism."

Jesse snorted and rolled his eyes. "You're weird. Algebra is fun. Next year I'll have Geometry, and I think it looks really neat already."

They were two houses down and across the street from Mia's when Leon 's Mustang screeched to a halt.

Crap.

Well, at least it wasn't Vince.

Leon leapt out of the car and ran over. "Jesse, what happened to you?"

"Johnny Tran," Jesse spat. "Brian chased him away."

Leon nodded. "Hey, let me get parked better, and then we'll get you inside and cleaned up, and I think you and Brian need to tell Dom just what the hell happened."

Brian trailed the two of them into the house. Dom was sitting on the couch playing GTA with a pretty Latina .

Glancing up from the TV, Dom said, "Damn, Jesse, you look like 40 miles of bad road."

"It was Johnny Tran," Leon said.

Dom leapt to his feet, game forgotten.

"Brian made Tran back off."

Dominic dragged a hand over his scalp and said, "Letty, make sure the mad scientist gets cleaned up okay. He nodded at Brian and pointed towards the kitchen. "We gotta talk."

**~oo(0)oo~**

By the time he climbed on his bike that afternoon, Brian really, really liked Dominic Toretto. He couldn't wait to meet Dom's father, Nick, who was out of town filling in as a mechanic on the NHRA circuit.

It turned out both Leon and Jesse lived there. Both had nowhere else to go, so Nick Toretto had taken them in.

And then there was Dom himself. Mia had said a few times that there was just something about her brother, something like gravity, and Brian finally saw full on what she meant. How many 18 year old guys could be trusted to keep the family store running, go to school, and be trusted not to party like madmen the minute their parents vanished? And, get this, nobody in the house seemed to think it strange that Dom just did it.

As Brian and Dom and Leon sat at the kitchen table drinking ice cold Gatorade, they just talked. After Brian had explained about Johnny Tran, the topics of conversation turned to school, sports (both Dom and Leon wrestled), and cars (Dom seemed to find the MR2 was worthy). And while Brian found out about Leon and got on with him, things between Brian and Dom just … clicked.

Like the way it did with Rome , except that Brian doubted he would have to follow Dom around, bailing his ass out of trouble, the way he had with Rome , or the way that Dom did with Vince. Vince, by the way, was Dom's best friend, even though Dom admitted, "I end up wanting to strangle him at least once a week." Brian laughed at that and talked a bit about Rome and some of the crazy shit they had done.

After rolling his bike into the living room, Brian walked into the kitchen room. "Hey Mom," he called out.

She stepped into the doorway, putting her hand over the receiver, and chirped out a cheery, "Hey, kiddo!" before diving back into her conversation about the problems the Log-Cabin so-called Republicans caused for the rest of the party. Brian rolled his eyes and took the stairs two at a time to his room. His mom got so wound up over politics and kept telling him to take the liberal wool off from over his eyes whenever he said something she didn't agree with.

Whatever.

He just made it a point not to talk politics with his mom.

Besides, it wasn't like he could do anything to change the lay of the land. Hell, he couldn't even vote. He opened his desk drawer, pulled out the notebook, and began writing about what had happened, and about how cool Dominic Toretto really was.

 

**~~(Interlude == Midterms)~~ **

 

Hands pillowed behind his head, Dom stared up at the ceiling.

Life really, really sucked sometimes.

Like right now, for instance.

Normally Vince just had to look at a guy making overtures to Mia and they put their tails between their legs and ran off. Nobody had ever had the stones to stand up to Vince before, and without thinking about what the fallout could be, Dom stood up and did the right thing, let Brian have a shot at Mia, and Leon, as Leon always did once Dom had made up his mind, backed him. Besides, if the guy was a jerk, Dom would just pound the snot out of him.

And then it turned out that this new guy, Brian, was actually the kind of guy who deserved to have a girl like Mia.

The kind of guy a guy like Dom could fall for if he wasn't careful.

Torching for guys caused Dom enough problems already, like being in the locker room, or getting distracted when he was wrestling a guy, or just dealing with Letty.

Sigh.

Letty. If only Letty were a guy.

She loved cars as much as he did, so they had that in common. And Dom loved the fact that she was such a firecracker -- God, she'd even tell Vince off. He had known her since the day she had started kindergarten with Mia.

When it became pretty damn clear that Letty had set her sights for him, and wouldn't take no for an answer, she ground him down. Besides, she was perfect cover. Sorry girls, he could say, I have a girlfriend. She goes to St. Marks. It's just that Dom felt bad about using Letty . She deserved a real boyfriend, not someone going through the motions.

Years ago, when Dom began to realize that he was not like the other guys, he figured he could just wait it out. When he turned 18, he would graduate, move across the country, and just do what he wanted and nobody would ever know.

Yeah, right, because "life is what happens while you're busy making other plans." After cancer took his mom, too many people ended up depending on him. Dad, Mia , Leon , Jesse, Vince ... and he just couldn't handle the thought of having them turn their backs on him and hate him.

Besides, secretly, super careful like, he looked at gay websites down at cybercafés, or snuck a quick glance at The Advocate and Out, and even brushed by the edges of a gay pride parade once.

He didn't find anybody like himself. Blue collar, into the right kind of cars, or even anybody who had to deal with the kind of responsibilities he had.

Sometimes, on nights like this, it seemed like everybody was going to find somebody. Like everybody was allowed to have somebody, except him.

Dom couldn't wait for wrestling season to begin. In between practice, school, working at the store, and fixing up Leon 's car, he would be so fucking busy he wouldn't have time to think about anything else.

Sigh. If only Letty were a guy. He could have somebody.

Except she'd probably be the first to kick his faggot ass.

With a groan, Dom rolled onto his side. If he had to spend time staring sleeplessly at something, better his poster of an Acura NSX than the off-white nothing of the ceiling.

 

**~oo(0)oo~ **

 

With the start of regular soccer practice, pick up games in the park dried up. Fine by Brian because that just meant more time to spend hanging out with Mia and the rest of "Team Toretto".

Mia. Coolest girlfriend ever. Gave him plenty of space, unlike a lot of girls Brian had known or seen, who wanted their boyfriends around 24-7. Mia had no problem "sharing" him with Dom and the rest of the team. She also understood that grades were important and that Brian had obligations to the soccer team.

It worked both ways, too. Like Dom, Mia could be incredibly focused. Dom kept saying that she was going to do them all proud and become a doctor. She would just snort and roll her eyes at that. As she and Brian sat down and crammed for a Bio test one Thursday night, he wondered how she managed to find time to cram in cheerleading, working at the store (although Nick Toretto had finally come back, which took a considerable load off of her and Dom), holding down a 3.8 GPA, and still find time to spend with him. Not a lot of time, but still some. Brian was totally cool with giving her all the space she needed, because he had no delusions about her being "his woman" -- like he owned her or something.

They may not have seen a whole lot of each other, but time spent with her was almost invariably time spent with Dom and the crew, and vice versa.

Oh, and God, the Toretto house. Talk about the complete opposite of life with his mom, where things were quiet and orderly. Things never got really quiet at the Toretto house. Somebody was always doing something or saying something. In fact, Brian's house began to seem almost creepily quiet in comparison.

His mom complained a bit about how she "never saw him anymore", and about how she wanted to meet his friends, but after one Saturday afternoon when Dom and Leon came over and the three of them combined managed to wipe out the cold cuts, the peanut butter, all the OJ, and an entire loaf of bread, she stopped complaining.

The fact that Brian's mom also liked Mia helped. It was mostly because Mia "was on the college track" as opposed to Dom who was doomed "to wear a name tag and have grease on his hands." His mom only softened a little towards Dom when he diagnosed and replaced the faulty thermostat on her overheating Acura in about an hour, refusing payment, asking only the cost of parts. Brian found himself ranting in his journal for three pages over that incident. In the end, to keep things as peaceful as possible between his mom and his friends, Brian brought them over as little as possible.

As he jogged up the driveway to Dom and Mia's house, Brian noticed that Nick Toretto's truck was gone, but that Vince's Camaro was parked out front. He rapped on the back door and was a little surprised when Nick let him in. "Dom and Leon should be back pretty soon with the engine hoist," Nick explained. "Coffee? OJ?"

Brian poured himself a glass of juice and sat at the table with Nick. Through the doorway he could see Vince sacked out on the couch.

Nick saw him notice, sighed heavily and said, "Toretto's House of Strays. If you turn up on our doorstep, we'll take you in." He finished his coffee. "Well, the market's not going to open itself," he sighed. "I'll be back around five to see how it's going."

"Do you need a ride, Nick?" Brian noticed that the keys to the Honda were not hanging by the door.

"Nah. I'll just take The Beast. She needs to be driven at least once a month anyways, keeps her juices flowing."

"The Beast?"

"What? You mean you don't know? Come with me, kid."

They stepped outside and Nick unlocked the padlock to the garage. "Dom may have his little rice rocket," Nick said, "but I'm all about good old-fashioned Detroit metal."

Brian had assumed that the garage was just filled with stuff in storage. He had never gone in there or had a reason to peek in the windows. His first impression was that of a sleeping dragon, coiled in its lair, waiting for the unwary or foolish to enter. "Wow!" he gasped, "What kind of car is that?"

Nick tisked. "What kind of car? You youngsters don't learn nothin' these days. This, m'boy, is a 1969 Dodge Charger."

Brian simply gaped at the mysterious black and silver behemoth of a car. "I've never seen one before," he said. "Um. How many gallons to the mile?"

Nick's laughter, so like Dom's, rumbled from deep in his chest, "About seven to nine city, 12 to 15 highway, depending on how you drive it. Not that we do a lot of driving. Nah. I mostly drag her. Dom and I just finished fixing her again last year."

"What happened?"

"Oh, she had so much torque off the line that she bent her chassis. Getting that trued again and properly reinforced was a bitch, let me tell you."

Brian knew that Dom liked to drag race his Civic down by the railroad tracks. Thinking of what The Beast could do versus Dom's Civic, he said, "Boy, I'll bet he likes to drive her."

"Strangely enough, he never has. Never even asked," Nick replied. "Maybe it's something to do with the fact that I bought it about six months after his mother died as something for us to do together to keep us from going crazy with misery from missing her," Nick's voice trailed off. "We didn't start work on it until a few years later, though." Visibly collecting himself, he continued, "Well, I'd better fire her up and get to work."

A few seconds later the Beast rumbled to life, slithered down the drive into the street, and roared away in a cloud of burning rubber.

Yeah, shit. Brian completely understood how somebody could have the heebie jeebies about driving a car like that. He walked back into the kitchen to discover that the noise must have woken Vince up. He stumbled into the kitchen, bleary eyed, clad only in his jockeys. Since Vince had heard of how Brian had stood up for Jesse, an uneasy truce existed between them. Vince would never like Brian, but at least he wasn't actively hostile any more.

"Where's Nick?" Vince asked, yawning.

"At the store."

"Mmmm." Vince opened the refrigerator door and stuck his head in. Given the angle, the closeness, and Vince's near nakedness, Brian couldn't help but see the bruises on Vince's body. Bruises like that didn't just come from football, and a knot the size of a baseball on your lower back, just above your hip, couldn't be good.

Vince's eyes locked with his. "The fuck you staring at, faggot?!"

Brian ignored the dig. "What the hell happened to you?" Without thinking, his hand tentatively reached out in the direction of the bruise on Vince's hip.

Vince shied away, wincing in pain. "None of your damn business," he snarled.

Okay. Brian let it be.

Vince poured himself a bowl of Captain Crunch and began chewing noisily through it, pausing only long enough to ask, "Why are you over here so damn early?"

" Leon's engine started making a weird noise on the way home from the game last night. Dom says it's the connecting rod bearing, and I guess the only way to fix it is to take the engine out of the car. So I'm waiting for Dom and Leon to get here with the hoist."

"I guess it's a good thing I ended up here after all. Somebody has to keep the mad scientist out of your hair," Vince said.

Brian shrugged. "Jesse's a good kid. I like him."

Vince slammed his spoon back into the bowl, splashing milk on to the table. "I ain't saying he's a bad kid. He's just a hyperactive motor mouth is all. You guys will get more done if he isn't there asking a million billion questions, or playing with the tools and getting them all out of order. I like Jesse fine. Doesn't change the fact that he's a scatterbrain."

"Oh. I thought you were going to help with Dom and Leon."

"Nah." Vince poured himself another bowl of cereal. "I've never been much for engines. I don't care anything about cars except how fast they go."

Silence fell. They were saved from having to find something to say by the near simultaneous arrivals of Mia -- somehow looking as beautiful as ever in a pair of old sweats -- and Dom and Leon in the truck.

Everybody's eyes widened a bit upon seeing the bruises Vince had, but none of them said anything about it. The atmosphere was ... edgy ... and Brian was really glad to get out of the kitchen.

Because he had not done much work on cars before, Brian thought he would be relegated to reading the Chilton's manual. Nothing doing. When Brian had mentioned last night that he wanted to learn more about cars, Dom had apparently been very serious in his offer to teach Brian, and Dom believed in hands on learning.

Which is how Brian found himself, wrench in hand, Dom right behind him, giving instructions. The nearness, the proximity of Dom's body had a strange effect on Brian. He felt weird, and his stomach got fluttery.

Brian had always noticed guy's bodies. In fact, he had no problem admitting to himself that a guy's body could be just as interesting, just as eye catching, as a girl's. Brian considered himself a connoisseur of the human body. Of course, trying to explain this to another classmate and not have them think you were a complete homo because you thought that guy's had neat bodies, too, was impossible.

(Just admired the human body. Riiiight.)

But there was just _something_ about the proximity of Dom's powerful and beautiful body to his. Brian could feel the heat coming off of it through his T-shirt, and the hand laid on his back as Dom steadied himself as he leaned in to point out the next bolt that Brian needed to tackle felt like a firebrand, and that faint whisper of air along the back of his neck had Brian's stomach doing flip-flops. A part of Brian wanted more, and a part of him recoiled at the thought. After two hours, he felt like he would come apart at the seams. He almost sighed in relief when it came time to finally pull the engine and transmission out of the car.

Vince kept Jesse out of their hair until just after lunch, when he had to get ready to go to work at a local pawn shop. Brian actually goggled at the notion of somebody as techy and cranky as Vince behind a cash register, but Leon caught his eye and said, "Man, would you try to knock over a store with old coyote there behind the counter?"

Vince flipped Leon the bird as he roared off.

Leon smiled and said something about watching Vince sing a different tune the next time the cooling system on that damn Chevy went.

About 30 minutes after Vince left, Brian was almost ready to get down on his knees and pray he would return to deliver them from Jesse. The 8th grader buzzed around the garage like a roadrunner on speed.

After another hour, Brian could tell that even Dom and Leon, used to Jesse's endless motion and chatter, had reached the end of their tethers. Luckily by that time, they had reached a logical stopping point in the job, so Dom covered the exposed engine block with a sheet of plastic, and they pushed the Mustang out of the garage and back to the curb so that Nick could park The Beast there when he returned from work.

By that time Letty had swung by and Mia was back from a cheerleading fund raiser, so everybody ended up in the front room, watching Pimp My Ride on TV. Somehow Letty, Dom, Brian, and Mia squeezed onto the battered old couch. Well, actually they only fit because Mia sat in Brian's lap, which, oh God, was wonderful. Her body felt so soft and smooth as he put his arms around her, and he liked the faint citrus scent of her perfume. He just prayed his body didn't decide to do something stupid like pop a boner, because he would die of embarrassment.

(And he was not the tiniest bit aware of every place where Dom's body touched his. Nope. Not aware of that at all. Not liking it. Not thinking it felt so right. Nope, not at all.)

"Y'know," Jesse blurted when the episode finished, "we should nominate Leon 's car."

"Nah," Leon rumbled, "my 'Stang is nowhere near piece of shit level. Just needs new paint and some TLC."

Undaunted, Jesse pressed on. "Is too. You've got those ratty seat covers because the vinyl's all cracked, and your dash is cracked all over, too, and foam keeps leaking out of your seats, and the roof lining is all in tatters, and the windows don't roll up well."

"We'll fix it up right, just one thing at a time," Dom said.

"B-but --" Jesse sputtered, so wound up he couldn't get a coherent thought out.

"He's got an idea in there somewhere, I think," Brian began. When nobody else butted in, he continued, "We could get the engine tuned up to run like new, but shit, if we could get MTV to pay to have it repainted and upholstered .... I think it's worth a try."

"Can't hurt," Letty said, and Dom nodded in agreement.

Leon jumped to his feet and gestured emphatically. "Earth to Team Toretto. Did you even see that last episode? They put a goddamned fish tank in that dude's car. That Nile chick got a fucking river in her Cadillac. Does that crap look like me? Do I need a fucking LCD and DVD player in my car? Shit no. I need them upstairs in my bedroom."

"But Leon , it would be sooooo cool to watch Initial D or Lodoss in your car!" Jesse yelped.

"Nah, Jesse. You mean you think it would be cool for you to watch all that fucking anime in my car and run down the battery and get fucking Pringles bits everywhere and then spill your coke on the seats."

Jesse huffed, "Look, I didn't eat or drink in your bed again, okay? I'm not stupid. I wouldn't spill my coke in your car and it was Doritos, not Pringles."

"See the kind of crap I have to put up with sharing a room with him?" Leon said, looking pointedly at Dom.

Dom rolled his eyes. "I still ain't sharing my room with you, Leon. You snore."

"Do not."

"Do too!" Jesse interjected. "And you talk in your sleep all the time. 'Ohhhh Miiaaa. Ohhh -'" he moaned as he leapt to his feet and ran for dear life, Leon in hot pursuit as Dom, Mia, and Letty roared with laughter.

Brian had to admit it was pretty damn funny. This is what it must be like having brothers.

Leon came back about three minutes later with an armlock on a squealing, squirming Jesse. "Yo, Dom. What say we bust out the mat and wrestle a bit?"

"Yeah. Sounds good."

Brian and the girls moved the barbeque and the table aside as Leon and Dom lugged a large mat out of the garage and unfolded it to cover half the back yard. It was not regulation size, but it was certainly better and safer than going for it straight on the ground. That task done, Leon and Dom disappeared for a few minutes, Jesse tagging after.

Letty looked at them and said, "There are times I realize Leon 's a lot smarter than he looks."

Mia said to Brian, "Leon and Dom are teaching Jesse how to wrestle. They say its so that if somebody like Johnny Tran tries something, he'll know what to do to get away, but if all goes right --"

"Jesse will be too pooped to pop tonight," Letty finished and both she and Mia smiled at the prospect.

When Dom and Leon stepped into the back yard a few minutes later, dressed in their singlets and headgear, Brian had a hard time keeping his eyes from popping out of their sockets. He knew that Leon and Dom had good bodies, but knowing it and seeing it … two completely different things. Those singlets didn't cover much and what they did cover they fit like a glove.

(_Hot Damn!_)

Brian felt himself flushing a bit as he catalogued their bodies while the two of them started Jesse in a series of running and stretching drills. When Leon began a series of takedown and escape drills with Jesse, Dom turned to Brian and asked for his help in giving his shoulders an extra stretch.

(Ohgod ohgod ohgod, the thought of touching that body …)

Brian froze like a rabbit in the headlights for a split second, then moved to stand behind Dom and take his wrists.

"Thanks," Dom rumbled, "When wrestling a guy as greasy as Leon , it helps to have all the flexibility you can get."

"Hey, I resemble that remark," Leon laughed. "The nickname's Soap, not Crisco."

"Soap?" Brian asked.

"You'll see in about two minutes," Dom said.

Brian thought it would be no contest. Leon had a strong, well toned body, but he weighed 180, and Dom was at least 225, all of it muscle. But try as Dom might, he could never seem to get Leon in a position to execute a pin. Not only could Leon move with surprising swiftness, but his body twisted and flexed in ways that Brian almost didn't believe were humanly possible.

For instance, Brian noticed Dom get the kind of armlock on Leon that Leon had gotten on Vince that day at the store. But by instantly arching his body -- in a way that looked almost painful -- as Dom began his spin, Leon flexed out of the hold, and a second later turned the tables on Dom.

"Damn!" Brian murmured. "I had no idea Leon was so good."

"He made it to the Masters," Mia whispered, "but then he got appendicitis. It actually burst. He's lucky to be alive."

However, Leon couldn't pin Dom, either. Dom had sheer strength on his side and knew how to use it, plus leverage, to brute force himself out of several holds.

The sight of their bodies, sliding over and around each other in such a raw display of strength and skill was …

(incredibly arousing).

Brian found himself half-panting, eyes fixed on the pair as he wrapped his arms around Mia, hugging her from behind, savoring, needing, the feel of her skin against his. He kept sneaking little kisses on her ear -- which made her shiver against him in the most wonderful way -- whenever he could bear to tear his eyes away from the sight of Dom and Leon going at it.

Mia responded by running her hands along his forearms and hands, her fingers feather light, and, glancing over her shoulder with a saucy look in her eye, she subtly wiggled her rump against the hardness straining in Brian's jeans.

Ohgod.

If it weren't for the fact that it would be incredibly tacky, coupled with the fact that Dom would probably kill him, Brian wanted nothing more than to take Mia back inside to that battered old couch, or better yet, her bed, and touch her and kiss her, and just savor her sleek gazelle-like body until he knew it as well as his own.

  



	3. Chapter 3

Her lips were soft and warm and wet, and the flavor of them just said, "Mia" and Brian just kept kissing her as his body moved against her, and in her, and she cried his name with each stroke and he was so close, so close ....

And suddenly the body changed. And he was kissing Dom, devouring Dom and it was the best feeling ever --

\-- with a strangled groan Brian sat up, shaking.

No. Fucking. Way.

No fucking way.

But Brian couldn't ignore the evidence as it cooled and became sticky in his pajama bottoms.

He changed, and resolutely thought of Mia until sleep claimed him again.

**~oo(0)oo~**

Monday at school, Dom caught him in the hallway and pulled him aside. "I've been thinking about Pimp My Ride," he said. "Do you have a camcorder?"

"No," Brian replied.

Dom's face fell.

"But I do have a digital camera that can do some video clips. I've got a flash card big enough to do up to 2 minutes of video," Brian said.

Dom nodded thoughtfully. "Well, it's not like they're expecting the world's greatest looking video. You do have a way to get everything all edited together, right?"

Brian smiled and said, "Dude, I have a Mac. We can get it done."

Dom flashed a killer smile and clapped him on the arm. "Great. Start shooting."

**~oo(0)oo~**

The days fell into a rhythm for Brian as the end of the second quarter drew near and the holidays approached. School. Soccer Practice. Toretto house -- sometimes doing homework with Mia, but mostly just hanging out. Home for dinner with Mom. Homework &amp;TV. Bed. Wash, rinse, repeat.

Fridays and weekends were all Toretto all the time. Friday nights were spent at football games (the team had made the playoffs) in the bleachers with Dom, Leon, and Jesse, sometimes Letty, while Mia and Vince were on the field below, and afterwards there was pizza. A few hours each Saturday were usually devoted to working a bit on Leon's Mustang -- which was his dad's -- or tuning Dom's Civic to get every last bit of juice out of it for some street races. Or, before it got too chilly, they barbecued a lot of food on the grill out back. A few times, Nick Toretto took them out to vast empty parking lots and warehouse districts and gave them all lessons in how to drive, and Brian loved pushing his MR2 to the limits and seeing just what, exactly, it could do.

All of this gave Brian the perfect excuse to bring his camera and TV link cable along. He'd snap a few stills, and then shoot a few more seconds of footage for the Pimp My Ride project.

The only fly in the ointment was that Brian hadn't heard a word from Rome. He had sent three letters to Rome, even gave him the new phone number, but so far, not a single reply or call. The phone calls Brian could understand -- Rome probably wanted to spend his phone privilege talking to his family.

Brian sighed as he opened the door to his house. He came home straight after soccer practice because nobody was going to be at the Toretto's this afternoon. Leon had work, Mia had cheerleading for a basketball game, and Dom had to take a shift at the store.

Normally Brian's mom made it home about 15 minutes before he did, which worked out well for both of them, but tonight Brian beat her home by a good two hours. He swung by the mailbox to see if the newest issue of Sports Illustrated had come in yet.

Nope. But there was a letter from an inmate at the Herman G. Stark Youth Correctional -- Rome! Woo hoo! Psyched, Brian tore into it.

In Rome's familiar scrawl the letter began:

__

Brian,

What the fuck is up with you? I've asked in my last three letters if you could come and visit during visiting hours on Saturdays, and haven't heard jack from you, and, needless to say, it's pissing me off. I don't even know why I'm bothering to write any more --

Rome had written. Rome had been writing him on a regular basis.

And there was only one explanation for not getting a single letter.

Mom.

She had gotten them all and not passed them on.

Brian had heard about people 'shaking with rage'. He had never done it before. A part of him wanted to yell and scream at his mother the moment she walked through the door. A part of him wanted to smash that collection of ugly Hummel figurines she kept in the china cabinet. And a calmer part of Brian argued that he should do nothing, say nothing, but just keep on as if he had not discovered anything.

Hot rage swelled up again. No. He couldn't let her get away with this. How _dare_ she do something this completely fucked up and shitty!

Brian hopped on his bike and pedaled like mad for Toretto's. He hoped the store would be fairly quiet so that he could have a good talk with Dom.

Bustling through the door he said, "Dom! I need to ask a favor."

Dom shrugged as if to say "ask".

Taking a deep breath, Brian began, "I've got this friend, Rome, who's in big trouble --"

"Nope. Not posting bail." Dom crossed his arms.

Brian paused a moment, not quite sure of what to make of this little nugget of insight into Dom's world that he had just gained, but quickly gathered himself and forged ahead. "It's about three months too late for that. He's already in Chino. He's a good guy, but got talked into something stupid because ... because I wasn't there anymore to keep his ass out of trouble. Anyhow," Brian's voice broke as the magnitude of his mother's betrayal slammed into him yet again, "My-my mom's been keeping his letters from me, and I'm so mad at her I'm going to be grounded for life. I was wondering if I could talk you into letting him mail his letters to your house. That way you or Mia could give them to me."

Dom nodded yes.

Brian gulped and said, "If I give you gas money, can I talk you into driving me out there once I'm not grounded? Or at least covering for me while I drive out there?"

Dom's brow furrowed in thought. "I'm just not getting one thing here, Brian. Why are you going to be grounded?"

"Do you think I'm letting her get away with this?!" Brian shouted.

Dom shrugged again. "What, like yelling at her and telling her that you know will do any good?"

With a sigh, Brian deflated. Dom could just see exactly what to do sometimes. It's what made him such a good sounding board. Dom knew how to shut up and just listen better than anybody.

"Look," Dom said, "don't tell your mom jack. Parents, once they've made up their minds -- shit. Mia and I would love for our dad to stop working himself into an early grave. We'd get by with his money if he got a regular job as a mechanic or the money from this place, but back to you -- I'll drive you over to visit your friend. I've been kind of wanting to take a road trip in the Civic."

Brian laughed. "Chino isn't exactly a road trip. It's like two hours, tops, if traffic is shitty."

"Yeah, but it's something different. I almost never make it out to that side of things."

Feeling much less ground down, Brian beamed. "Thanks, Dom. You're a real friend."

It was probably just his eyes playing tricks on him, but Brian could've sworn that for a split second, Dom looked almost sad before his usual calm and in charge expression slipped into place.

**~oo(0)oo~**

Not saying anything to his mom about the letter the moment she walked through the door took a great deal of effort.

Brian sat at the kitchen table, forcing himself to say nothing as she made dinner.

Finally, after Brian had poured himself a glass of milk and was about to tuck in, she said, "Bri-bri, why are you staring at me like that?"

"Like what?" he snapped. Hmmm. Maybe he had been giving her the evil-eye. Quickly he added, "I had a shitty day at school. And I don't like that nickname. I'm not seven anymore."

"Language. And do you want to tell me about it?"

"No. Not really."

She put her fork down. "Brian."

"What?"

"Don't you 'what' me."

Brian gave a sigh just short of a groan. "I just had a bad day is all." A split second later he improvised. "I found out that somebody lied to me today, and okay, I'm still kind of pissed off about it. Pissed off at myself that I even believed them for like, point four five of a second."

"Oh, Brian," his mom crooned soothingly, "Is there anything I can do?"

"No," Brian said, proud of himself for not saying, "Yeah, you can stop stealing my fucking mail." He shoved in another bite of Tuna Helper with peas and started chewing. God. He was so fucking tired of Hamburger/Tuna/Chicken Helper. Mom's home cooking had gone out the window when she got this job. It seemed like all they ever ate these days was one dish meals from a box or grocery store rotisserie chicken and green beans.

"It was Mia, wasn't it?"

"What?!" Brian choked on a pea. "No Mom, it wasn't Mia."

"It is, I can tell."

Brian rolled his eyes at his mother. A big no-no, but still.

"Then who was it?"

God. She wasn't going to let this go. He thought for a moment and said, "Vince."

"Do I know him?"

"No. He's a friend of Dom's. He's had a long time crush on Mia and keeps trying to break us up."

His mother took a swallow of her wine and said thoughtfully, "You know, maybe you and Mia ought to slow down. Seventeen is awful young to be going steady. She's what, sixteen?"

Pausing for a moment to savor the fantasy of heaving the bowl of tuna noodle glop at his mother, Brian chugged his milk, then said, "Mom, I don't want to see another girl. Mia and I hardly see enough of each other as it is. She's got a job, she's serious about grades, and she's a cheerleader. I don't want to talk about it, and I'm not going to break up with her just because you say so or because of some stupid lie that some jerk said, okay?" He shoved back from the table without waiting to be excused.

His mom didn't say anything, but the white tension lines around the edges of her mouth spoke volumes. He snorted in amusement as he placed his dishes in the dishwasher. Where did she get off? Back in Barstow, she wanted him to have a steady girlfriend and spend less time with Rome. Now that he had a steady girlfriend, she wanted Brian to break up with her. Whatever. Not sparing her a glance, Brian went to his room, shut the door, and didn't talk to her for the rest of the evening.

Opening the drawer, he took out the old composition book and poured it all in.

**~oo(0)oo~**

Thanksgiving was next week. Back in Barstow, most of the times they just ended up at the Joiners, friends of his mom's, for dinner. Since Brian had nothing in common with Steve Joiner other than the fact that they both lived in Barstow and went to the same school, he just ate, said a few words to everybody, and spent the next three hours wishing that the next three hours would pass by faster.

What Brian really wanted for Thanksgiving was to have his friends over and hang out all day to eat and watch football, and he would snuggle up to Mia on the couch. He still couldn't believe sometimes that he was dating this perfect, smart, complete babe. And, Dom's on again off again relationship with Letty might be on again, so that way he and Mia wouldn't be the only couple.

But there was no way in hell that Brian's mom would cook food for a group like Team Toretto, nor would she fit in at the Toretto house at all. Her one meeting with Nick Toretto had been ... strained. God. His mom had always been something of a keeping up with the Joneses snob, but since she had taken this job with Blue Sun, it had gotten ten tons worse.

As he came into the kitchen for dinner, he noticed his mom at the table, waiting.

Uh-oh.

"Brian, my boss is giving a formal, black tie Thanksgiving dinner ..."

Sometimes, his mom could actually be cool. Brian smiled, "And you know how much I do not dig that stuff."

She smiled. "Thanksgiving's never really been a big holiday for us. I'll bet if I help you bake some pies, you can crash the festivities over at Mia's house."

"It won't be crashing. Mia and Dom already asked. I haven't answered yet." But inside, Brian was saying, she's giving me her blessing to spend time at Mia and Dom's?! Maybe she wasn't such a snob after all. "I'll just explain to Mia and Dom that the choice is a black tie or time with them, and that's not a choice at all."

His mother raised an eyebrow at the phrase "Mia and Dom".

"What? She's my girlfriend, he's my best friend."

Smiling slightly sadly, his mom said, "She's a good girl, but you can do so much better than him."

Okay, she _was_ a fucking snob.

"Y'know, Mom, I'm sorry that I don't like stiff and formal black tie dinners where people ass kiss their bosses, and I've figured out that I'll just have to live with the fact that you're never going to like any of my friends. Yeah, Dom is going to have a job where he works with his hands. So fucking what?

"In the mean time, he helps his father run a business, keeps his grades up enough to wrestle, helps take care of a hyperactive kid who isn't even his own brother, does chores around the house, and is teaching himself so he can take the Honda certified mechanic's test. So yeah, when he graduates, he's going to go to his $20 an hour job and after a few years, he's going to take what he knows about cars and the day to day running of a business and look into starting his own shop. So yeah, he's a complete fucking works with his hands low life grease monkey," Brian spat the words out.

"I just wish you would make friends with --"

"With guys like that nice Steve Joiner? Mom, the guy was a fucking triphead. He dealt pot and ecstasy."

His mom looked at him, mouth agape for several moments before gathering her wits and saying acidly, "Yes, well, your good friend Rome is in prison."

Brian felt a strange, perfect calm flow through him. "Yes, I know," he replied.

"How?"

"I called his house from a pay phone when he didn't reply to my emails."

"Oh."

"And I've also found out that you've been keeping his letters from me."

Brian thought that that little bombshell would shock and fluster his mom, that she would go angry and evasive and he could move in for the guilt trip score. Instead, with perfect iciness she replied, "You are not going to associate with him, ever again. Do you understand?"

"Yeah, well, catch me if you can." Brian gave a vicious smile and snarled across the table, "Go ahead and ground me if it makes you feel better, if it makes you feel like you're doing something to protect me. Just don't hypocrite too much the next time you and your religious reich Republican friends get all bibled up, okay?" Brian spun on his heels, snagged his keys, and marched out the door. His mom yelled after him to get back right now, but Brian didn't give a damn as he revved the engine to redline and tore out of there.

He drove around in circles for 15 minutes before ending up Dom's. It was the rarest of rare occasions. Dom was home and nobody else. Leon was at work. Mia was with some classmates working on a group project for history, while Jesse was at a friend's house watching some anime. Nick was at the store and Vince, for once, happened to be at his house. Just him and Dom. Which was kind of cool, because while Mia always had a sympathetic ear, some things just went better when said to another guy.

Dom sat on his end of the couch and listened, Playstation forgotten, as Brian vented his end of things. When Brian finished, Dom said, "Damn. That's completely fucked. Tell you what, Brian. Come over first thing in the morning on Thanksgiving and we'll drive out to visit Rome and be back in time for dinner."

Brian beamed in thanks. This was just so ... Dom. To think about what other people needed and just do it. It's what Mom just didn't get about what made Dom so completely amazing as a person.

After a minute, reality crashed back in. Brian gave a rueful laugh and said, "I can't believe I went ahead and told her to ground me."

Dom smirked. "Genius move. Either way you win."

Brian raised an eyebrow. "Huh?"  
Dom shrugged eloquently. "You don't care. She can't kill you, and she won't take soccer away because there go scholarships if she does, so grounding you was the scariest thing she had, and you're not scared of it. And if she ends up grounding you now, she ends up looking like a complete bitch and she knows it." He grinned.

Calm. Analytical. Mediocre at book learning, but street smarts had made Dom as good at reading people as anybody Brian had ever met. Problem solved. Brian flopped down on the couch next to Dom and picked up a controller.

After a few moments of Resident Evil, Dom glanced over at him and asked, almost hesitantly, "You want to go run Mulholland tonight?"

Brian blew away a zombie and said, "What?"

"Mulholland Drive. This really cool road along the crest of the Hollywood hills. When I'm -- when shit's just going wrong, I like to go up and drive along Mulholland."

"Sounds cool."

"Good, I'll tap on your window around two."

"You mean two in the morning?!"

"Best time to go out there and do it. Almost no traffic. It's just you and the road coming at you out of the black." Brian glanced over at Dom to see that the look in his eyes had grown distant, almost dreamy, the game completely forgotten. Dom continued, his voice almost yearning, "When I run Mulholland, or I'm flying down a quarter mile, it's the only time I really feel alive. It's the only time I'm ever free." He looked at Brian, his eyes large and bright with naked emotion -- but just for an instant. Then the usual reserve slammed back into place.

Brian almost wondered if he'd imagined the longing he saw there.

**~oo(0)oo~**

The sound of something smacking against his window in the middle of the night startled Brian out of a very vivid dream about playing in the World Cup with David Beckham. Slipping his shoes on and grabbing his coat, he tiptoed down the stairs and outside. It was cold out, but not nearly as cold as it got in the thin desert air of Barstow this time of year.

As they took the freeway north and west, Brian marveled at how empty it was, and yet at the same time, he wondered why anybody would be out at 2am on a cold November night at all.

Over the muted thump of some trance techno, Dom said softly, "Yeah, you wonder what brings the rest of the people out. What kind of jobs they have that gets them up in the middle of the night, or what kind of errand they're running, or where they're going. Or maybe, there's some of them like you. Driving because they can't sleep and can't take staring at cottage cheese on the ceiling a moment longer. I guarantee you that we'll see at least three other people out on Mulholland, and they're there for the same reasons -- they can't sleep and want the thrill of whipping around those s-bends."

Brian nodded. Perhaps it was the darkness -- the only lights in the car being the dim glow of the dash and the stereo -- but it seemed like some sort of private movie theatre, so they only spoke to each other if something absolutely had to be said.

Dom said that they were going to make the run from West to East. Start in Sherman Oaks and end up on the Hollywood freeway not far from Echo Park. That way they wouldn't have far to drive when Dom started feeling sleepy. The Civic began quietly cutting its way through suburbs and Brian found himself wondering about the people who lived in these neighborhood, wondered what their houses and yards and cars said about them.

The Civic snaked up the hill and along the crest, Dom keeping the needle pegged at an even 65. Brian found himself white knuckling it at times when Dom blew through curves clearly marked 35 on a road designed for a leisurely Sunday drive. Beneath them, on both sides of the ridge as far as the eye could see, greater metro LA spread out, a glittering swath of gold, platinum, and copper sequins. Awesome.

Brian spared a glance at Dom as they whipped around another curve.

The expression on Dom's face was a mixture of rapture and deadly concentration. Dom's brow had a slight furrow while his eyes gleamed with something more than the lights of the dashboard, something Brian couldn't quite find a word for. But, in the end, it was his lips that caught and held Brian's attention. Large, and lush, the bottom one moist and shining with a thin gloss of saliva, because Dom chewed it in moments of intense concentration as the Civic rocketed through the bends, but parted now, as Dom's breath panted softly through them.

(Did they taste like Mia's? Was it different? Were they softer?)

With a soft moan under his breath, Brian tore his eyes from Dom's mouth and forced himself to look at the road, the looming blackness, the glittering city below ... anything except Dom.

Without warning, Dom braked hard, cranked the wheel and sent them sliding broadside into a scenic turnout. When Brian's heart dropped back down into its normal place, he found Dom leaning over, pointing out a few Studio City landmarks, but Brian barely heard a word Dom said because all he could think about was Dom, so close to him, and if he turned his head --

(that mouth would be right there, and all he would have to do ...)

He groaned inwardly. If it was Rome, Brian might try it. Give in to this completely insane urge to kiss another guy and just chalk it up to one of those crazy things you do with a crazy guy like Rome. Not that he and Rome had ever kissed. They just got straight to the business of relief.

But this wasn't Rome.

It was Dom.

Brian wasn't about to take that chance. Not with a guy whose sister he was dating. Not with a guy who could snap him like a twig and leave him here, miles from home. And how the fuck would he explain_ that _to his mom? "Uh, hi Mom. I snuck out in the middle of the night and kissed my girlfriend's brother who proceeded to beat me a good one and then dumped me on Mulholland drive 20 minutes from the Hollywood freeway. Can you come pick me up?" Not freaking likely.

But that didn't even touch on the real question. The godzilla sized question rampaging through his brain -- since when the fuck did he want to kiss a guy?!

(Since forever. Just as much as girls. Maybe more, even.)

What the fuck was up with that shit?

(Nothing.)

Girls. He liked girls. He wanted Mia. She was everything a guy _should_ want.

(Yes. But you want Dom, too.)

Just before Brian's brain went into meltdown, Dom's presence over his shoulder vanished and Dom turned the car off, unbuckled, and got out.

Gasping with relief, Brian followed.

It was cold on the ridge, not near freezing, but noticeably colder than it had been down in Echo Park. Brian wondered if it ever did get cold enough to freeze in LA, wondered if it ever got cold enough up on this ridge to give everything a ghostly white rime of frost. Or, were they too close to the ocean for that? It was weird. The idea that the calendar could say "November", but lawns stayed green because they hadn't had a freeze yet.

"Does it ever freeze up here?"

Dom shrugged. "Don't know. I've gotten out and seen my breath a lot of times, and I've had to use my defroster. Why?"

"We should do this again some night in January or December, when there's a really crisp cold, and everything" Brian gestured at the lights below "will be super clear, and it will seem like --"

"You can almost reach out and touch it," Dom murmured softly, almost in his ear.

Rattled, Brian stepped to the right and spun.

It almost seemed like --

(Dom was coming on to him)

\-- a date with a girl you don't know that well, but really like a lot and Dom was acting like a guy too nervous and shy and unsure of her feelings about him to make the first move.

Yeah, right. Because no way in hell could that be possible.

Brian studied Dom's profile intently for a moment, but saw only a blank, emotionless slate. Eyes that glimmered in the dark, but only because they reflected the lights of the city below. A shiver ran through Brian. "It's late, I'm cold, I'll be in the car."

Dom paused for a moment, deep in thought. "Alright, you do that," he rasped in a tone that made Brian think that he had discovered something, but wasn't quite sure what.

The rest of the drive home continued at breakneck speed, and in near silence, neither of them feeling the need to fill the air with words.

Dom simply nodded as he drove off. Brian, feeling like a zombie, crawled into bed.

Morning came much too soon.

 


	4. Chapter 4

Thanksgiving dawned cool and cloudy. As Brian bundled pie stuff into a bag, his mother asked, "Sweetie, why are you up so early?"

"Mia thinks it would work best if we baked the pies before they put birdzilla in the oven. Besides, if I'm going to chow down with them, it'd be kind of nice if I help them mash the potatoes and stuff."

His mother smiled a bit thinly and said, "Well, just let me know how it turns out."

"It's pumpkin pie, Mom. Not chemistry." As an afterthought he added, "Your hair looks nice." She had had it specially done the other day. Brian didn't think it was anything that Miss Clairol couldn't do, but he wasn't going to say so.

The only people up at the Toretto house were Dom and Nick. Dom didn't say anything as he poured coffee in a travel cup.

"Where you going so all fired early?" Nick asked.

Oh shit. So, Dom hadn't talked about going to Chino with his dad. Brian's stomach tied itself in knots.

"Nothing big. Brian and I just got an errand to run. A favor for a friend."

"Dinner is at three."

Dom gave a lopsided smile, "Like two guys like us are going to miss food."

Nick laughed. "No, I swear you guys have hollow legs or something." He waived them on.

From the look on Dom's face as they got on the I-10, Brian could see that Dom had something big on his mind and really didn't feel like talking. Fine with Brian, because he had what seemed like nine million things buzzing through his brain, not the least of which was the trip to Mulholland, plus he felt completely amped about seeing Rome , and Brian knew that if he started talking, he wouldn't stop until he had completely emptied his brain.

As they hit the 71, Dom opened up. "After my mom died, I did two years in Juvie."

Brian choked on his coke.

"Yeah," Dom continued, turning the stereo off, his voice barely audible above the hum of the engine. "Assault."

Brian looked at him. He had zero idea what to say, or if he should say anything at all.

"My dad and Mia coming to see me, it meant everything."

"You did time in Chino ?"

"No, Chino 's for older offenders. I got sent to Stockton . The California Youth Authority is like a fucking industry up there."

"Dom, what happened -- I mean, I understand if it's none of my damn business."

"After my mom died, I was just so angry," Dom said. "Dad meant well, but he was just so busy working the store and taking odd mechanic jobs to pay the bills and make ends meet. He didn't want to lose the house.

"And Mia, well, Mia's always been the good girl, but everybody was just like 'Oh, poor Mia, she just lost her mother, that's so hard for a girl her age' and nobody had a damn thing to say to me. Everybody just seemed to think that I was fine. That I could suck all that shit up no problem. By the time my dad began to realize that something was wrong, I was primed and ready to blow.

"So, I'm down at the track with Dad one day, in the pit, and I had done something stupid, and Dad had just ripped me a new one. And I'm going to the porta potties, and there's this kid, Kenny Linder. I had never gotten along with him." Dom took a deep breath, his hands clenched the steering wheel. "I was walking by and he said something about my mom. I should have let it go. I should have fucking let it go ...

"But I didn't. There was a tool chest right there and I picked up this wrench, a big one, like 19mm, or something, and I just fucking beat him senseless," Dom finished in a rush.

"Shit ..." Brian breathed.

"Yeah," Dom said bitterly. "So on top of the hospital bills, and the house, and all the other day to day costs of having kids and a business, there's now all the shit with court and Kenny's bills.

"I really, really fucked him up. I don't think I was whaling on him for more than 30 seconds, but he almost lost an eye, and his coordination and balance ... he needs a cane to walk now." Dom took his eyes from the road for a moment, his gaze drilling into Brian. "It's why I never let anything get me really mad, ever. I get really mad and I can hurt someone real bad.

"And jail?" Dom swallowed hard. "I'll die before I go back. I'll fucking die before I go back, Brian."

In an effort to lighten it up, Brian shrugged half heartedly and said, "And here you are taking me to Chino ."

"That's different," Dom rasped. "Visits from Dad and Mia are what kept me human. It's ... you have to be hard to survive, and you're so scared and lonely. But every month Dad and Mia came for me. That -- and there was this one guy who worked there. He was different. He didn't talk at you. He just listened. Helped me a lot."

~oo(0)oo~

Seething mad, Brian slammed into the bench next to Dom. It turned out that minors, if they were not family, were not allowed contact with inmates of a CYA facility unless accompanied by a family member.

Well, didn't that just fucking beat all.

The guard behind the desk was nice about it, but firm. The rules were the rules and her hands were tied.

In a shaking voice, Brian explained the situation to Dom, doubly pissed that Dom had driven him all the way out here for nothing. Dom took it stoically and sighed. As they stood to go, Dom seemed to notice something interesting on the "Pictures of your CYA Staff" board. Clapping his hand on Brian's shoulder, he guided him back to the desk.

"Ma'am, is Warden Clark in today?"

She shrugged. "For a few hours. Why?"

"Could I possibly speak with him?"

The guard sighed and said, "He really doesn't have a lot of time. His schedule's usually pretty tight and I think he wanted to work on a few projects undisturbed."

In an earnest voice Dom said, "Ma'am, I got to know him a few years back up at Stockton . I just -- he made a huge difference in my life. Got me turned the right way. Can you please just see? I want to touch base and pay my respects is all."

Something about the seriousness of Dom's plea made the guard visibly soften. Her brow furrowed in thought, and with a shrug, she relented and picked up the phone. "Sir? There's a young man named --"

"Dominic Toretto"

"-- Dominic Toretto here to see you. Thinks you might remember him from Stockton . Sure. Yes. Yes, sir." The guard hung up the phone and said to them, "He'll meet you over by those doors in about five minutes."

A middle aged, slightly balding man with a graying moustache appeared at the door a few minutes later. His face brightened with a look of recognition when he caught sight of Dom.

"Hey, Mr. Clark!" Dom beamed, holding out his hand.

Mr. Clark ducked around it and instead pulled Dom into a backslapping bear hug. Stepping back, he looked Dom up and down and said, "You've grown, Dominic."

"Yeah, Mr. C, that happened -- just like you said it would, though I'm no b-baller." Pause. "I wrestle."

"Do you now? What brings you out here?"

"Brian and I," Dom nodded over at Brian, who smiled and held out his hand "drove over to visit a friend of his, thought he might want to see someone from the old neighborhood, but ..." Dom shrugged eloquently. "Then as we were going, I saw your picture on the wall, and thought I'd ask if you were here today."

"You always did have uncanny luck, Dominic. I was about to leave for home. Why don't both of you come on up and we'll talk."

Brian trailed a few feet behind them as they walked down a featureless hallway, his Chucks squeaking a bit on the well polished (and well worn) linoleum. He didn't understand how anybody could stand to work here. It seemed so cold, so colorless. There were no posters, no bulletin boards, just bare walls and old flooring.

They took a short elevator ride to the administration wing. Plusher, but still impersonal. Too neat drawings on the walls. Excruciatingly PC upbeat posters extolling the virtues of books and learning and the arts.

Dan Clark's office, thank goodness, was not impersonal. Brian had to give him that. Plants. A battered, much loved Jimi Hendrix poster. Model cars. A well worn couch. The books in the bookcase were a hodgepodge that looked like they'd actually been read and were chosen because Mr. Clark liked them, not because he wanted to impress anybody.

"How's school, Dominic?" Mr. Clark asked, as they both settled into the chairs in front of his desk.

Dom snorted. "Call me Dom. It's okay. I keep my grades good enough to wrestle. Mia, she's the smart one. Brian, too. It's why they get on so well. Always studying together."

"Any chance of a scholarship?" Mr. Clark kept his voice neutral.

With a groan Dom said, "Yeah, I get hassled all the time. I'm a really good wrestler, but, let me be honest. I don't really like school. I get by. When I graduate, I'll get a job."

"So, no interest in giving college a try?" Again, the voice was neutral.

"Nope. Not unless there's a four year program that will let me wrestle and get a Honda certification."

Mr. Clark snorted.

"Yeah, I didn't think so."

Mr. Clark smiled and nodded, "So long as you genuinely like what you do, Dom. Depending on how good you really are, there could be a lot of pressure on you to go to college. Just so you know. Just be really careful if you sign anything."

"I know, I know. There's been some college coaches by. I haven't signed anything."

Mr. Clark nodded and shifted his attention to Brian. "You say a friend of yours is here?"

"Yes. I was hoping to visit him. His name is Roman Pearce."

With a heavy sigh Mr. Clark buried his face in his hands for a few moments, causing Brian's heart to sink. Then he said, "So, if you're good friends with Dom and his sister and live in LA, how do you know Pearce?"

"I grew up in Barstow ," Brian replied, and quickly told Mr. Clark the rest of the story.

When he finished, there was a long pause while Mr. Clark finished spindling a paper clip. "You know that you can't visit Mr. Pearce. It's a CYA reg, and there's no way around that." Mr. Clark leaned back in his chair, put his hands behind his head, and smiled. "However, the young man knows the rules, but the old man knows how to sneak around them.

"I've been meaning to have a 15 minute attitude adjustment session with Mr. Pearce." He picked up the phone.

~oo(0)oo~

He's _changed_, Brian thought the moment a guard escorted Rome into the room. Rome strutted in a way that was hard somehow. Because he kept his eyes riveted on Mr. Clark from the moment the door opened, he didn't see Brian and Dom sitting on the couch against the wall opposite the desk.

"What 'chu want, Clark ?" Rome all but snarled.

"Six weeks paid vacation in the Virgin islands and a blow job from J-Lo. Turn around, Pearce."

Sulkily Rome began his turn and the instant he caught sight of Brian the look on his face snapped from one of sullen anger to delighted surprise. "Bri-an!" he shouted, holding out his cuffed hands.

" Rome !" Brian leapt from the couch and launched himself at his best friend, nearly knocking him into the desk.

Rome snorted, "Damn, I know I'm fine, but restrain yourself, whiteboy."

Brian pffft'd and whapped him in the head. "You earned that," he said when Rome threw him a chagrined look in reply. "How are you?"

"Fine -- who's this?" Rome looked over at Dom, sitting on the couch.

"My friend Dom."

"Okay."

As he looked at the glances that passed between Rome and Dom, Brian had no idea how or why, but it had taken them about .005 seconds to look at each other, size each other up, and decide to _not_ like each other. It made the rest of the visit, short as it was, tense somehow, even though Brian and Rome spent all of it jabbering, catching up, and even laughing a few times.

And why, as Rome said, "See you next time, coz!" did it some how feel like good-bye?

(Because the Rome you knew has changed. The Rome you knew doesn't exist anymore.)

Try as he might, Brian couldn't get that niggling little voice of doubt to go away.

~oo(0)oo~

"I'm sorry about your friend," Dom said as they pulled out of the parking lot.

Somehow, having Dom try to be nice and understanding just put Brian on edge, so he nodded and said, "If it's cool, I don't want to talk about Rome right now. I'm still trying to ... digest, I guess, the way he's different now."

"It's totally cool. We'll go home, watch football, and a few minutes before dinner you'll help Mia and me beat up potatoes."

Brian smiled weakly. Dom gave his shoulder a squeeze. "How are you on that footage?"

"It's coming along. We should have enough in a week or two."  



	5. Chapter 5

There was no table big enough for all of them except the picnic table in the back, but nobody wanted to figure out how to lug it in, and nobody wanted to go outside into the gray November and eat.

They ended up in the front room. Dom smiled apologetically at Brian as he and Vince hunkered over the coffee table. Brian shrugged and sat down on the floor next to Mia. He was all ready to tear into the huge pile of turkey, potatoes, peas, stuffing, and cranberry sauce when she deftly removed the fork from his hand.

Huh?

He reached to take it back, but she playfully swatted his hand and used the fork to scoop up a big bite of gravy soaked stuffing.

Ooookkkayy.

Brian shrugged and opened wide as she fed him. Of course Nick, Dom , Leon and Jesse thought that this was one of the silliest things, ever, but Mia had made up her mind; she wanted to feed Brian, and, well, okay. Girls were weird sometimes.

Besides, it made Vince practically _glow_ with jealousy. Always a good thing in Brian's book.

He decided that if she was going to feed him, he would feed her. He picked up a carrot stick from her plate -- carrot stick?! what kind of crap rabbit food was that?! -- and held it to her lips. Mia giggled (god! what a beautiful sound!) and bit down. Brian fed her turkey shreds and carrot sticks as she forked him full of cranberry sauce. Glancing down at her plate, Brian noticed that she had no more finger foods left. He reached for her fork, but she stayed his hand and murmured, "No, use your fingers."

"Mia, it's peas." But in the face of her stubborn insistence he picked up two butter slippery peas and pressed them to her lips and she --

Ohgod.

Her lips, soft, tickling.

The delicate hint of her tongue.

It

\-- Vince stormed off the couch and into the kitchen muttering darkly about people who needed to fucking grow up and not eat like babies --

went

\-- Jesse said something about it being better than the spice channel, while Leon flushed beet red --

straight to

\-- Nick smiled at them, a wicked, yet fond glint in his eyes --

his dick.

Dom's face could have been carved from stone as he kept his eyes unwaveringly glued to the TV.

Brian swallowed hard. Oh God. Thank God for baggy jeans. He wanted a second helping of everything, but Mia seemed to be done eating, and he didn't want to send her to wait on him, and if he got up now, it meant being in the kitchen with Vince. Not that Vince would try anything really stupid, but Brian just didn't feel like dealing with the jackass remarks that Vince would make. He just didn't want anything to spoil his good mood. Brian set his plate aside and held out his arms for Mia to snuggle into.

Besides, not having a second helping of everything meant he'd actually have room for a big ass piece from the pies that he and Mia had baked.

~oo(0)oo~

Bored with the football game and not really having much to say to an unusually taciturn Dom and also since Vince was back in the room, Brian got up and wandered into the kitchen.

The dish washer churned away, but on top of that Mia stood at the sink, up to her elbows in soapsuds. Brian slid his arms around her. "Hey," he murmured into her ear, "What's this? Haven't those bozos in there heard the rule that the cook does not clean?"

She chuffed. "Boy, I'd like to live in a house where that was the rule."

Gently nudging her aside, Brian took the sponge. "I'll scrub, you dry."

"Awww, Brian, you don't have to ..."

He kissed her cheek. "But I want to." He picked up a plate and began scrubbing away.

"Heh. That's real sweet." Vince's voice came from the general direction of the doorway.

Mia turned. "Pie's on the table, whipped cream is in the fridge."

Ignoring her, Vince continued looked at Brian and continued, "After you're done there, put on a dress and I'll take you down to the mall so you can go giggle with the rest of the girls, or, better yet, I'll take you home to meet the folks."

"Vince!" Mia shouted, pissed.

Brian put a hand over her arm. "No, Mia. It's okay. Just give me five." Brian gave Vince the dirtiest look he could muster as he edged past him, ignored the cursory glances of the rest of the guys as he darted in front of the TV, and sprinted up the stairs.

Brian had no idea where this crazy notion came from, but, shit, he couldn't wait to see the look on Vince's face when he came back down. He whipped open the door to Mia's closet. She had to have something suitable .... He pulled out a red dress.

(Wow! He'd like to see Mia in this!)

Behind him the door creaked open. "Brian?" Mia asked, softly, hesitantly.

He turned, red dress in one hand, black one in the other. Her eyes snapped open and her hands clapped over her mouth to hold the laughter in. "Oh you _wouldn't_!" she gasped, delighted.

"The hell I won't. Which do you think?"

An evil, impish grin crossed her face. "Well, neither, actually. I have a better idea."

~oo(0)oo~

Mia had to be the coolest girlfriend, like, ever, Brian thought as he looked at himself in the mirror 20 minutes later.

~oo(0)oo~

Hair gelled into ringlets, made up, nails buffed to a shine, clad in pantyhose, one of Mia's cheerleading skirts, and a tight pink sweater, Brian flounced down the stairs. "Vince," he falsettoed, "I'm ready to meet your folks."

Immediate results.

Leon spit pie.

Jessie knocked both his and Leon's cokes over.

Nick choked on his beer.

"What?" Brian cooed, raising a glossy nailed hand to his lips in a mock shocked gesture before mincing over to the couch to sit down on the still frozen with shock Vince's lap.

As soon as Brian's body touched his, Vince shot to his feet, sending Brian tumbling to the floor.

Gasping with laughter, Nick managed to choke out, "Vince, that's no way to treat a lady." Which caused everybody else to laugh all the harder.

Furious, Vince picked up his plate and hurled it across the room.

Dom, smiling to hold back the laughs, looked up at Vince and said, "He got you good. Now take it --" he lost it completely "-- take it like a man!"

With characteristic ill grace, Vince picked up the shattered remains of his plate while Brian climbed back to his feet and preened and posed for the rest of them.

Throwing his arm around Mia's shoulder a few minutes later, Brian announced, "Hot lesbian dishwashing action in the kitchen, boys." And the two of them pranced through the doorway, Leon 's comment of, "See V, that's what happens when old coyotes try to take on the road runner!" following after.

~oo(0)oo~

Brian had so much fun with Vince's discomfort that he decided to play hostess with the mostest for the rest of the evening. Leon fell right in with it, even going so far as to feel Brian up. "Oooh, socks! My favorite," he leered, peeking down Brian's shirt, which sent Nick into fits of laughter while Vince scowled and sulked on the couch.

Brian even made a show of even sitting on Dom's lap a few times, but there was just something uncomfortable about that. Dom made all the same sorts of jokes as Leon and Nick, but his eyes rabbited and he never held Brian's gaze for more than a split second, and whenever Brian got in his personal space, Dom seemed stiff, tense. Almost like Dom liked having Brian on his lap, but at the same time was afraid of it.

Eventually, Brian looked at the clock and saw that it was 11 o'clock. Shit. His mom would probably be home within an hour or two. Nick had conked out in his chair and everybody else had started to crack big yawns.

No freaking way could he go home like this -- although the idea of the look on his mom's face had Brian smiling.

Turning to Mia, Brian pointed to his face and asked, "This stuff comes off with soap and water, right?"

"Most of it does. Here." She took his hand and led him upstairs to the bathroom.

It took a couple of passes with the eye makeup remover -- geez, makeup was more complex than he realized -- to get the last traces of the mascara off. Not that Brian minded its stubbornness. He had kinda liked sitting on the lid of the toilet, eyes closed, while Mia's soft fingers trailed, soft and silky, across his face. "I should give you a facial," she said, her voice teased gently.

If being given a facial meant that he would just sit back and float in heaven while Mia would softly touch his face while smoothing various creams and whatever kind of gook women put on for facials, Brian could take any kind of ribbing from the guys. They didn't know what it felt like to have fingers like feathers touching your face.

Toweling the last of the water from his face, Brian wandered out of the bathroom and headed back into Mia's bedroom. She followed behind and closed the door. Sitting on the bed, he took off his shoes and socks, and alas, ripped her poor over taxed pantyhose as he tried to shinny them off. A second later he shucked the sweater and reached for his shirt when he realized ... "Mia, my clothes please."

"Only if I can put them on you."

The faint hum of the TV and the ticking of the clock broke the silence.

Shit.

She meant it.

"Uh ... Mia?" He stepped toward her on legs suddenly gone rubbery, clad only in that too short skirt, instantly hard. "That might not be such a good idea." He made a move toward his jeans, planning to go commando, since she still had his boxers, but with a gazelle like leap, she stopped him, underwear dangling provocatively from her fingers, yet just out of reach.

"I promise I won't do anything you don't like, and I'll still respect you in the morning."

Brian's mouth turned cotton dry. "Mia ... I-I'm ... I mean, do you have any idea of what --"

"Oh, I have _every_ idea, Brian," she said, and gave him a little push toward the bed.

Not that she had to push hard, or push at all.

Brian had had a few make out sessions with Mia before. Nothing much, they both had such busy schedules and limited privacy. As he lay back on top of the bed with her body atop his, all he could think about was the sheer danger of getting caught and the fact that it had taken about two seconds for that fucking skirt to ride up.

After about seven glorious minutes of holding her underwear clad body and cupping, and touching, and stroking, and feeling the way she moved and that tantalizing hint of dampness between her legs, her hands, likewise stroking, moved right _there_ and brought matters to a crisis.

"Mia," Brian panted, tearing his lips from hers, "I figure --" kiss "-- we got at most --" kiss "-- 15 minutes _ohgod_ \--" kiss "--before there's --" kiss "-- a knock onthedoor." The last bit came out in a squeaking rush as she slid a finger along his length.

She looked down at him, her eyes dark pools of fire. She looked so wanton and eager, nothing like the nice girl studious cheerleader he knew.

He grabbed her hands. "Look. We've got to stop or it's going to get to the point where something has to happen, and I can tell you now I want to be in you in the worst way, but --"  


"So why don't you?" Mia guided his hand down towards her panties. "I want you to be first." At that moment she let him feel _exactly_ how ready she was for him.

"Not on the bed -- noise." He gasped, then, "Protection?"

She climbed off her bed and on to the floor, opened her nightstand, and handed him a condom. "I took it from Dom," she said with a wink.

Brian opened it and handed to her. "You put it on."

He had never felt anything so wonderful as the feeling of her fingers on him as she smoothed it down his cock ...

... until he started to go in.

Perfectly hot and gripping him better than any hand, and the slickness beat lotion all to hell.

As he got all the way in, he noticed Mia biting her lip.

"Does it -- am I?" He whispered.

"'S all right. Feels good. I feel ... full somehow."

He took that as a sign to go for it. As hard and fast as he dared, brain frying with the livewire incredibleness of it all, but at the same time the need to keep an eye on his watch and the need to not make noise but to bite his lip and keep it all in and the fear of getting caught somehow robbing what should have been the greatest thing ever of any real pleasure.

Brian had wanted his first time with Mia to be really special, not feel rushed or dirty, or possibly end with an irate Dom or Nick, plus a phone call to his mom. Even the wicked thrill at the idea of getting away with it did not make up for the need to just shut up and get it over with.

A moment after he came, Brian rolled off. "Did you come?" he asked, glancing over.

"Yes," she lied.

He stood up and skinned the condom off. He thought he saw something that looked almost like a leak. Nah, that couldn't be. Just some girl juice. Brian paused for a moment and then carefully wrapped it in Kleenex before tossing it in the trash. He decided to say nothing because there was no point in getting Mia all bent out of shape over nothing.

Because it was nothing. It_ had_ to be nothing.

"Is something wrong?" Mia had gotten back into her jeans and was quickly brushing her hair out.

Brian pulled his shirt over his head. "No." Sigh. "I just wanted our first time together to be really special, not spur of the moment."

Wrong thing to say.

"Oh." Her voice was winter cold.

Shit. "Look, it's not like you weren't great, and I hope I was good, and ... I just had this romantic idea of dinner and flowers and --"

She cut in her voice a whip crack hiss: "And maybe I'm tired, sick and fucking tired, of being good sensible Mia Toretto. The responsible one. Maybe I'd like to be spontaneous."

"I'm sorry." Brian laced his shoes. "Look. We need to get downstairs." Actually, Brian was willing to go the 'I'll call you tomorrow' route, but then it dawned on him that he'd rather not run a gauntlet of Dom, Nick and Vince alone. As they clomped downstairs, hand in hand, Brian noticed with relief that Nick still snored away in his recliner, and that Vince had left in the interim.

Leon greeted them with a smirk. "Have a good time?"

Fuck! Busted! Brian could feel himself start to flush something fierce and hoped that the dim light in the room hid it some.

Mia gave Brian a cool glance then said to Leon , "Good." Smile. "But not fantastic, if that's what you're asking about."

Brian chanced a glance at Dom, who gave him an almost stony, distant look before turning his eyes back to the TV. Brian shrugged it off, kissed Mia goodnight, and headed out the door.

~oo(0)oo~

If Dom was angry at Brian, by Monday it had blown over. If he knew that Brian and Mia had done more than make out, he gave no indication. Vince, of course, was extra crispy bitchy, but Brian had developed a thick skin regarding Vince's mouth over the past few months.

Outside of Biology, Brian gave Mia a quick kiss. "Is everything okay?"

"Yeah, why wouldn't it be?"

He shrugged. "Don't know. Just paranoid, I guess."

Mia smiled. "I take it you made it home okay. Don't worry, Dom's totally cool. He owes me for all the times I haven't narc'd him out." She squeezed his hand and took her seat.

Brian wondered if Mia would expect something different now in their relationship. He hoped she wouldn't become too clingy -- he'd seen that happen with some friends back in Barstow . Thing was, he didn't feel magically closer somehow to Mia. Nothing had changed. Because he did not want any extra complications in his life, not with the semester wrapping up and the soccer season hitting high gear, Brian hoped that she felt the same way.

Shit. Maybe he was just over thinking this and getting all bent out of shape over nothing.

And, at the same time, Brian wondered when she would want a repeat.

  



	6. Chapter 6

Despite the Hispanic population of the school, because soccer wasn't a traditionally "important" sport like football or basketball, the cheerleaders didn't start coming to the games until the team had a lock on a playoff berth. And while it was nice to finally have the official moral support of the school, it didn't help having a bunch of beautiful girls on the sidelines. Brian found himself distracted by Mia several times. One good chewing out from Coach Prince got Brian back in the game, though.

So far the team had gone undefeated, but today they were playing the team from Echo Park High, their traditional rivals. Hector had made some spectacular saves in order to help Ridgemont keep their one goal lead. Sure, the playoffs were a lock, but both teams wanted to go in as top seed.

But what really sucked is that the EPH players were doing everything they could think of to try and keep Brian out of the action. So far only some fancy footwork had kept him from going down, and despite his shin guards, he could feel a whole new crop of bruises. At least the ref had eyes in his head. Right now, both of their defenders had yellow cards for trying to take him out.

As the last five minutes ticked off the clock, Brian started to feel pretty wrung out. EPH had gotten a goal with ten minutes to go, tying the game. Everybody started playing with everything they had in them. One minute left before a sudden death overtime. Brian darted down the field, feinted left, shot right, and Paolo passed him the ball. He had the shot lined up and --

BAM!!

\-- an EPH halfback cleated him hard from behind. The stands erupted into boos on the Ridgemont side, but Brian barely heard it as he slammed to the turf. The world turned black and white and for a few seconds he thought he would lose his lunch. Out of the corner of tear-flooded eyes he saw the ref pull out the red-card and then Brian had his arms slung over Mike and Javier's shoulders and they were taking him towards the bench as Coach Prince ran out to them.

"--that fucking fucker! You hear that, Pasquale?! Your player is a fucking asshole! Guy like that's got no place on a team!" Coach Prince shouted to the opposite sideline.

"Watch the language, Coach." The ref said.

"You saw it. That bastard lined up the shot and went cleats first!"

"Yeah, and he's out of here. Now take your player to the bench and get this sorted before I've got to yellow card you. "

As sensations other than the sheer throb of pain returned to his left leg, Brian could feel the ooze of blood under his sock. "Coach," he gritted out between clenched teeth, "just wrap it tight in a bandage. Wrap it so I can't feel it. I want to get out there and take my penalty kick before the stiffness sets in."

"Are you sure, Brian?"

"Hell yeah," Brian hissed. "It's my kicking leg, not the plant, so I can still do it, Coach, I know I can."

Coach Prince looked up at the bleachers and thought for a moment then said, "Alright, Brian. One try and if it goes to overtime, you are not on the field, no matter what."

Pat, the trainer, wrapped the ace bandage as tight over Brian's calf as he dared, but it still took an assist from Javier to get Brian back on the field. He forced himself to stay focused on the game in an effort to keep the pain from kicking in.

"Are you sure about this?" the ref asked as the EPH and Ridgemont players lined up in front of the goal.

"Yes," Brian said through clenched teeth.

The ref set the ball on the ground and Brian took a hop-skipping run at it, the pain causing his eyes to stream water down his cheeks. Plant foot down, the kick ... the world turned to black and white … yes! He'd somehow managed to get the spin on it and -- GOAL!

Brian's legs felt like noodles and he forced himself to stay on the field and hop-skip in the general direction of the game as the last few seconds ticked down. When the final whistle blew, he slung his arms over two guys and they carried him to the bench where Coach Prince and Pat gloved up and unwrapped the bandage, cut off his sock and -- oh shit it was bad.

Pat held his ankle, turning it this way and that and told him that nothing there seemed broken or sprained, then as gently as he could (but ohjesus it still hurt so bad that Brian cried out) manipulated the calf. At last Pat sighed with relief. "I don't think your fibula's broken. It's all just bruised and strained, and then there's the scrapes ... " Digging into his first aid kit he swabbed Brian's calf down with betadine, then wrapped it in an ace bandage, snapped a chemi-cool pack and wrapped that in.

There was no way Brian could drive. Hell, there was no way he could walk for the next few days, probably even as much as a week.

By that time Mia had forced her way over. Brian looked at her and said, "Mia, can you get Dom or Leon? I think one of them's going to have to give me a ride home."

"I can drive you."

"Yeah, but then you have to walk and it's dark out."

"Brian," she huffed, "It's Echo Park, not South Central."

"Mia, please. Besides, somebody's going to have to give me the shoulder to a car, and as much as you're strong and in good shape, I don't think we'd get too far."

After a few minutes she returned with both Dom and Leon. Leon winced when he saw the cool pack on Brian's leg. "Aww, dog, that's not good. We saw it from the stands." He got down for a closer look.

"Yeah," Brian said, "I'm going to need a ride home."

"And one for the rest of the week, " Dom added.

"At least."

With arms slung over Leon and Dom, Brian made it to the Civic. Gasping with pain he flopped into the front seat and adjusted it back as far as it could go. Mia headed towards Brian's car.  


"We got a pair of crutches if you need them," Dom said as they rolled over the first set of speed bumps with a jar that set Brian's teeth on edge.

"I think I'll need them. I'll give you my firstborn if you remember them tomorrow."

Next set of bumps. Dom clutched, coasted, and then shifted. "Just don't get started on that firstborn thing anytime soon, right?"

Brian sighed. "Busted." But at least Dom was cool about it.

Dom looked over with a wicked grin and said, "You and Mia were about as subtle as a brick through a window."

Brian clapped his hands to his face and groaned before replying, "Well, it wasn't like it was a plan. It just sort of happened."

Dom's eyes became deadly serious. "You used protection, right?"

"No. We're a couple of complete fucking morons. Of course we used a condom! Sheezus!"

"Good."

Rolling his eyes and piffing air upwards, Brian said, "I never thought I'd have this conversation with you. Not in a billion years."

Dom looked thoughtful for a moment, shifted into gear as the light changed, and said, "Yeah. Well, the fact that I owe Mia big for covering my ass on several occasions is why I made Vince get the hell out before he could wake my dad."

"Dude, first and second born for that."

"You break her heart, I'll break your neck."

Brian smiled back at Dom. "But what if she breaks mine?"

"Well, we can still be friends. She's my sister, but there's always rule number two."

Brian gave Dom a look, so Dom explained, "When I was about six years old and my dad was going away on circuit he took me aside and explained the rules. Rule number one --"

"You don't talk about Fight Club." Brian couldn't resist.

Dom rolled his eyes. "Rule number one. Always be nice to Mom. Rule number two: Bros --"

"-- before hos." They finished in unison.

"Not that Mia's a ho, of course," Dom added.

They stopped to let Mia pass them and pull the MR2 into its part of the drive, then pulled in after. Brian opened the door and wondered how the hell he was supposed to get out.

"Here." Dom came around and gave him a hand up, while Mia followed with Brian's backpack.

His mom rushed out of the back door. "Sweetie, what's wrong?!"

"I got cleated," Brian gritted out as they hit the foot of the stairs. "Can you get me some aspirin or something?" Mia slipped ahead and held the door as somehow Dom and Brian clomped up.

As soon as Brian got seated in a chair at the kitchen table, Mia set his backpack down beside him and kissed him tenderly on the cheek. Dom squeezed his shoulder and said, "See you at 6:45?"

"Sounds right. I'll call you if I can't make it.'

Brian swallowed the Motrin his mother handed him and rolled his eyes as she insisted on unwrapping the bandages and seeing the damage for herself. "Oh, Brian," she cried, "are you sure it's not broken?!"

"I don't know. Coach and the trainer say it looks like a really bad bruise, a strain, and the scrapes. I'll be back to normal in a week or so." Actually, for all Brian knew his fibula could be broken or cracked, but he wasn't in so much pain that he felt like a trip to the local urgent care center. Because, frankly, if you weren't bleeding out, you spent the next three or so hours sitting on a hard chair, waiting, and if he had to sit home and ache with bruises, he wanted to do it on his couch or in his bed. "Sheesh, Mom! That fucking hurts!" he yelped as she prodded at the area of impact.

"Language."

Oh, pulleaze. "Mom, this is so not the time for that. Okay? Now is the time to feed me and then we can figure out how to get my ass upstairs, or at least make me a bed on the couch. I've got some homework to start, too."

Not that he got very much in the way of homework done. Even three Motrin barely took the edge off. By TV time, Brian couldn't stand it any more and had his mother take him to Urgent Care.

Verdict: cracked fibula.

Should heal completely in a few weeks. But no soccer. Not until next season.

He came home with a splint immobilizing his lower leg and instructions not to walk on it for another week.

After their hours long ordeal in the Urgent Care, Mom unbent enough to give him a double shot of rum for the pain and to help him sleep. Sure made scooting up the stairs on his butt a memorable experience.

~oo(0)oo~

The next morning at 6:45 sharp Dom knocked on the door. He listened to the bad news sympathetically then held out a pair of crutches. "Let's get these fitted to you."

As Dom loosened the wing nuts, Brian asked, "Where's Mia?"

"She figured she'd ride in with Leon."

"Oh."

Dom rolled his eyes and said, "Think about it, Einstein. Me tall. You taller. Crutches in back seat. Then there's back packs. Should we stuff her in the trunk?"

"Guess I'm being an idiot," Brian sighed. "Oh well, at least it's not Vince she's riding in with."

A guffaw of laughter. "Oh, he asked. And Mia looks at him all sugar and spice and says, 'Oh, I've already asked Leon. No point in you driving out of your way since he lives with us.' She hadn't of course, and Leon damn near blew it before I threw him an elbow."

Brian had to laugh. "Vince just doesn't know when to quit."

"No. 'S one of the things I like about him. You're not worried about Leon putting the moves on Mia?" Dom gave him a cocky grin.

"Nah. He thinks of her like a sister. It's Vince that you need to look out for. He'd go after Letty if he got a chance." With a groan he put his jacket on and slung his backpack over his shoulders.

Dom shot him an inscrutable look as he passed Brian the crutches back. "Oh, I never noticed."

Brian had to laugh. "Well, of course not! Do you think Vince is suicidal?"

Halfway to school, out of nowhere, Dom turned down the stereo and said, "This last breakup with Letty, I meant it. I'm tired of all her drama."

Brian nodded at him to continue, curious about where this was going.

"Well, should I go up to V and just say it's okay for him to ask her?"

"If that's the way you feel." Brian shrugged. Most guys were usually not keen on seeing their girlfriends pick up a guy on the rebound, while strangely enough, it almost seemed like Dom was eager to set Letty up.

Dom's brow furrowed in thought as he continued, "I mean, I've just got so much on my plate right now. I don't think I really have time for a girlfriend. But if she wants to go out with Vince, and he wants to go out with her, I should just get out of the way, right?"

Mentally Brian rolled his eyes. The stiff suspension on the Civic had his leg throbbing as they cruised over the patched and cracking pavement. "Yeah," he said after awhile, "just be cool about it."

"Cool about it," Dom echoed and didn't say another word until he deftly helped Brian out of the car, clapped him on the back, and told Brian to meet him in the gym after six.

~oo(0)oo~

Brian called his mom after school to let her know he'd be riding back with Dom and which meant more or less that he'd be home at the usual time.

His leg throbbed on and off all day. He had crutched over to the soccer field to watch practice, but riding the bench quickly became boring. Seeing the longing look in his eyes, Coach Prince flat out told him that he had no chance of taking the field before he was fully recovered, and that until he was recovered enough to help out a bit, he should take a break.

Brian crutched over to see if the library remained open after school. And it did, but only for two hours. He glanced at his watch. 4pm. Fucky fuck fuck, he thought and headed for the gym. At least he could go into the weight room and get some benches in. As soon as he saw the wrestlers doing takedown drills on the mat, that plan changed and he joined a small group of people in the stands.

Dom and Leon noticed him after a few minutes. Dom grinned at him before turning his attention back to his opponent. Brian spent the next hour watching the action on the mats and tumbling that grin over in his mind. It made him feel the same way Mia's grin did.

A hand on Brian's shoulder jarred him back to reality. It was Jimmy, the guy who did sports for the school newspaper. Brian almost sighed in relief when Jimmy asked if he wanted to talk about his injury and what this meant for Ridgemont's chances in the play offs? Brian all but heaved himself out of his seat and laboriously thumped out of the gym, half elated, half annoyed.

~oo(0)oo~

"Fucking things are killing me," Brian groaned as he nestled them in the back seat of the Civic.

"Eh, you'll toughen up in a day or two," Dom laughed. "You should've heard my Dad bitching when he was on them for a month."

Brian watched Mia get into Leon's car. No chance of studying with her tonight. It was her turn to work the store.

Dom cleared his throat. "There's a wrestling match Thursday night at seven. You coming?"

Considering the fact that Dom had come to several soccer games _and_ was doing him a huge favor until he could drive again, Brian figured he owed Dom, plus it was a chance to spend more time with him. Always a good thing. "Sure. I'll have to ask my keeper though."

"Cool. I'll pick you up at 5:30. Bring your camera, get some footage of Leon kicking ass."

~oo(0)oo~

Once again Dom showed up at exactly 6:45 and helped Brian get into the car. He seemed so happy about something that he almost glowed.

"Dude? What's up?" Brian asked. "You're wired like you had six cups of coffee."

"Just having one of those days."

"What, channeling your inner Jesse?"

Dom at least had the grace to shoot him a mock sour look.

As they sat waiting for the light to change, Brian glanced in the side view mirror. He could see Leon's car behind them, and Leon was making faces at Dom while Mia rolled her eyes and hid her face in her hands. Perhaps when he could drive again, he should pick Mia up, and then Dom and Leon could share a ride and save some wear and tear on Leon's old car. He scratched that idea a split second later. Both of them loved driving too much to give it up.

Thumping his hands on the wheel in time to the music, Dom said, "I talked to him."

"What did he say?"

"That he's asking her to the winter formal."

"Shit. I've got to ask Mia. How much are tickets?"

Dom glanced at him, and said, "I should know? I'm a free man."

Brian decided to change the subject. "So, who are you wrestling Thursday?"

"A guy named Eddie Carver, but --" Dom practically went through the roof with glee "Leon's got Lance Ngyuen, Johnny Tran's cousin, and Leon's going to **slam** him to the mat."

"So, Johnny's going to be there?" Brian kept his voice neutral.

"Hell, yes! And I'm bringing Jesse, too."

Brian bit his lip in thought. "Is that a good idea?"

Dom's eyes bored into his. "If we want to show the Trans that we aren't afraid of them, yes. That's the only way to show an asshole like that -- just call his damn bluff."

Dom talked about the matches upcoming and how Jesse was coming along as a wrestler the rest of the way to the school. As soon as he pulled into his parking space and killed the engine, he practically flew around the car to help Brian get out.

Brian grinned goofily at him. Dom fussing over him just made him laugh. The Civic was low, but not that low and after a moment's hesitation, he took the offered hand when he saw a flash of hurt behind Dom's smile. Dom. Big brother and father to everybody on Team Toretto.

"Sweet boyfriend you've got there, Dom," Vince called out as he walked up between cars.

Bam! In a move so sudden Brian wondered where Dom's hand had vanished, Dom whipped around and cold-cocked Vince, laying him out.

"Jesus Christ, Dom!" Leon shouted as Dom shook his hand to ease the sting.

Mia's mouth went slack in shock as she dropped her bag in her haste to get to Vince.

Brian's face must have shown the shock he felt at the suddenness and the _wrongness_ of what Dom had done, because Dom looked at him almost pleadingly for a second, and tried to say something before he stomped off -- in the wrong direction for his first class. Brian finally got to his feet, pulled the crutches out and shut the door. At his feet Leon and Mia were helping the still groggy Vince sit up. They looked just as dazed and confused as Vince.

Mia looked up at Brian, eyes huge. "Dom's never -- I mean, he and Vince have mixed it up before, but --"

"Not like this," Leon finished. "I have no idea what came over him. This morning he seemed ..."

Woodenly Brian said, "He was so happy in the car. Like everything was coming up roses for him." Glancing over his shoulder he found Dom sitting on one of the benches across the green, staring blankly into space. "Um... Should I go?"

"Nah. I'll bring him over." Leon stood and stalked off.

Clenching his teeth against the pain, Brian knelt down on the ground. "Man, Vince, you need to get some ice on that jaw."

"You really should go home, V," Mia said.

Vince went to shake his head no and winced at the motion. "Nah," he rasped, "I've got worse from my old man. Just give me a few minutes and if you've got some aspirin or something, Mia, I want it."

In a soft voice Mia began, "Vince, Dom--"

"'S okay. Bitch just has PMS or something."

Considering how many times he had thought the same thing about Vince, Brian chuckled at the remark.

Mia, however, was still fuming. "We should just leave and let him deal with getting his precious fucking car locked up. Maybe he'll forget and it will be stripped come lunch time. Asshole."

Both Brian and Vince gawked at her and snorted at the unreality of that statement. Dom not locking his car. Yeah, right.

"--lucky nobody really saw that, or else you'd be up at the office getting chewed out and suspended. Hello? No wrestling this week! What the fuck were you thinking?" Leon's voice hissed as he came over, arm slung over a contrite looking Dom's shoulder.

"Vinceimsorry." Dom mumbled.

Leon gave Vince a hand up and Brian slowly climbed back to his feet.

"Sorry, what did you say? I like couldn't hear it over the, oh, you know, general background noise." Vince's voice dripped with sarcasm.

"I said I'm sorry, man!" Dom snapped. "It was wrong of me. I should've said something, but I'm just sick and fucking tired of your mouth sometimes, Vince."

"Man, you know I didn't mean it," Vince said in a hurt voice.

"But you said it." Dom gave a sad, hitching almost laugh and said, "I keep saying that your big mouth is going to get you in trouble some day, but I never thought I'd be the one to shut it, not that way. Vince, man, I'm so sorry."

Vince slung a somewhat wobbly arm over Dom's shoulder. "If you ever deck me like that again .... Ah, c'mon, let's get some ice and some Tylenol or something." And the two of them wandered off.

As soon as they were out of earshot, Leon crossed his arms and leaned against the hood of his car, groaning. Brian nodded at him to go ahead. "Man," Leon said, "lately Dom's been really tetchy at home. Since Thanksgiving. Hair-trigger.

"Doesn't help that Nick's been talking about going back on the circuit soon again. He promised Dom that he'd stay home until graduation, but ... Nick just loves the track too much.

"And then there's the match this week. Dom's been wound up about that for the past week." Leon shook his head and sighed.

Brian shrugged. "He hasn't said a word about that stuff to me. Just been the usual stuff. Sports, girls, sports, cars, how my mom can be a bitch."

"Of course not," Leon chuffed. "He just thinks he has to go it alone on everything some times."

Before Brian could respond, the bell rang. He gave Leon a nod and crutched towards Mia and class.


	7. Chapter 7

By the time Thursday rolled around, Brian had actually noticed a teensy bit of improvement in his leg. He still needed both boot and crutches, but he figured he might actually start getting a bit of use out of it come the weekend, and maybe in a week or so, he could go without crutches all together.

Jesse squirmed and jittered next to him on the stands. Mia couldn't make it -- she had a group project for her World History class -- and Nick had to mind the store. Vince had been called in to work, plenty pissed about it, too. After seeing the disappointment and resignation on Vince's face as he huffed out of the gym, Brian vowed he would never take an on-call job.

Vince had been half-babysitting Jesse, and now that job fell to Brian. On the other side of the gym, Brian spotted Johnny Tran sitting next to an older guy Brian assumed must be his father. He saw the moment that Johnny's venom filled eyes spotted Jesse, and felt his rage begin to build. Brian glanced down at the RHS team, and saw that Leon and Dom had looks of their own for Johnny. Both also had a glare for a wrestler on the opposing team that could only be Lance Ngyuen.

Brian studied Lance. Shorter than Leon, but stockier. He looked nothing like his cousin.

The whistle blew, and the first wrestlers, the 98 pounders, walked on to the mat. It would be at least another hour until Leon and Dom went.

As the boys on the mat began their flips and tumbles, Jesse began telling Brian all the moves the two made, as well as pointing out what they would most likely do next, or the mistakes they made. The two guys moved so fast that Jesse could barely finish one thought before it was time to switch to the next. Brian chuckled a bit at this. At last, something that moved too fast for Jesse's mouth to keep up. Despite his scatterbrained nature, Dom and Leon had taught him well. Jesse didn't have to think about what he wanted to say -- just knew it.

"You dying to be the next 98 pound weakling?" Brian teased.

"They're not weak," Jesse interjected hotly, "just little, and they move a lot faster than the big guys, too. And I'm not going in at 98. I'll lift lots of weights over the summer and then I'll start at 105."

Brian smiled and gave Jesse a noogie. "And what if I show you how cool soccer is and all the chops I have with a ball?"

"Nah. Wrestling's cooler -- see, he's going to cradle him!"

Neither team had a weight forfeit. Some of the matches went quickly -- one wrestler using his superior skill (and sometimes dumb luck) to quickly dispatch an opponent. But funner still were the more evenly matched competitors, the matches that took all 3 rounds before somebody could claim victory. Endurance came into play on these, as well as skill and strength.

Despite what he had seen Dom and Leon doing, Brian cringed at some of the holds, falls, and flexes he saw. He wondered how Dom and Leon went to practice three times a week and didn't emerge as cripples. And then there were all the nosebleeds. One guy from RHS actually had to forfeit his match because they couldn't get his nose to stop bleeding in the time allowed. The more Brian saw, and the more Jesse told him, the more Brian began to understand how dangerous wrestling really was, and how, despite all of its rules and regulations, it really wasn't that far removed from a martial art. Some of those takedowns could really be used to hurt a person if done on pavement, especially if the person didn't know how to land right. And yes, given the right timing and leverage, even little Jesse could get Johnny Tran on the ground, or, at least wriggle away from somebody who had tackled him.

Finally, to several loud shouts of "Go, Soap!" Leon strode on to the mat. His singlet showed his bull dog physique to perfection. Brian hoped he wasn't staring too openly, but, damn, Leon was ripped and looked amazing. Brian turned his camera on and snapped a few stills. He had a 512 mb flash card, so he would have plenty of room left over to get a little video.

Brian observed that despite the fact that they both weighed 180, because he was shorter, Lance was more muscular than Leon and if he made 180 it was by the skin of his teeth.

Jesse replied, "Yeah, Leon's wrestled Lance lots of times, and he always beats him, but if Lance made weight the right way, it's not going to be easy. If he just squeaked in today, then he'll be too wrung out to wrestle well. Dom says that Coach Frame is a good coach because he never assigns a weight. Some coaches do."

Brian looked at Jesse.

Jesse explained, "Some coaches will tell you what weight they want you to wrestle at and will only let you go if you make their weight. They won't even let you wrestle off at a higher weight. It's the weight they want you to be or nothing at all." His voice lowered to a whisper, "Some guys have died trying to force themselves to make weight. Dehydrated. And if they do squeak into making a weight, they're too thirsty and hungry and tired to do well on the mat."

It became clear that Lance had made his 180 the right way, but it also took Brian all of 30 seconds to be reminded of what Leon had that Lance did not. Despite his size, Leon had the flexibility and speed of the flyweight wrestlers. Lance had skill, and even scored a couple of falls against Leon, but he could never get Leon for a pin; Leon always escaped or reversed. And, although Lance managed two escapes, he never put a reversal on Leon. With five seconds to go in the second round, Leon cross-faced and pinned him. Brian got it on camera.

"Way to go, Soap!" Jesse yelled along with half the stands and several of the RHS wrestlers. Dom high-fived Leon, who took the victory in his typical low key manner.

Two more weight classes stood between Leon and Dom. Brian found himself wringing his hands and wriggling in his seat almost as much as Jesse from anticipation.

The first wrestler swiftly won his match. The second won after a long struggle, the pin coming only after his tired and trembling muscles could no longer hold off his opponent's leverage and body weight. Which meant both teams were tied as Dom took the mat.

Brian put his camera to his face and studied Dom's sleek, panther-like body through the viewfinder. According to Jesse, on a lot of teams, the heavyweight wrestler was simply the fattest kid who showed up and survived training. Not so with Dom. Not in the least.

"Get 'em, Dominator!" several people near Brian yelled.

"He hates that nickname," Jesse whispered.

"Oh yeah? I'll have to remember to tell him it could be worse."

"Really?! How?"

Brian smirked, "They could be calling him Dominatrix."

Jesse looked up at him. "What's a dominatrix?"

Oh hell.

"Uh ..." Brian's mind scrambled feverishly to think of something to say as Dom and Eddie Carver took the mat and shook hands. "If you have to ask, you'll never know," he deadpanned.

"But if I don't ask, how else will I find things out?" Jesse pouted.

Groan.

"Look, I'll tell you later." Brian said, hoping that Jesse would forget.

Dom and Carver went into their crouches, waiting for the referee's whistle.

The way that Dom had talked about this match, Brian expected to see him explode at the whistle and slam Carver to the mat. Wam, bam, thank you ma'am. Instead, the two wrestlers circled each other, feinting, making hand-blocks, neither wanting to make a serious commitment.

Leaning over to Jesse, Brian asked, "How good is this guy?"

Jesse shrugged. "Don't know. He's a sophomore. This is his first time varsity. Dom might have seen him in some JV stuff, but ...."

The ref blew his whistle and cautioned both wrestlers for stalling. Again they squared off, eyes locked on each other, circling, everything else in the gym zoned out, and, just as the ref had grasped his whistle yet again, whip fast, Carver stuck. Snatching Dom's hands, he pivoted on his hip, slamming Dom to the mat. The entire gym, it seemed, winced in sympathy at the impact.

"Okay, he's good," Jesse said in a small voice.

And, as the two of them grappled on the mat, as Brian held his camera up and took a few shots, why did he feel that Dom was somehow going through the motions? That this was a --

Brian didn't get a chance to complete the thought. Lighting fast, Dom pulled a reverse and controlled the match from then on out. When Carver finally clawed his way to an escape, Dom swiftly snatched his legs out from under him.

The whistle blew, signaling the end of the period.

"Saved by the bell," Jesse said.

To Brian's surprise, when the match resumed, Dom took the down position.

"It's to do with points," Jesse explained. "Dom thinks he can get a reverse or an escape in before Carver scores a takedown."

"I'd still go with being on top."

"Yeah, but you don't know shit about wrestling or psyching-out a guy."

Sure enough, Dom rolled out of his opponent's attempt at a takedown and scored the reverse, but couldn't quite manage a takedown of his own. Eddie Carver had sheer tenacity and a certain raw skill that prevented Dom from getting an easy pin. Even Brian had to admire the way that Carver rolled out of Dom's attempt to get him with a Half-Nelson and scored an escape.

As the two once again circled each other to the cheers of the crowd, Brian's zoom showed a grim half-smile on Dom's face. Carver was no easy meat, but Dom's expression suggested that he had something up his sleeve while Carver simply looked frustrated and wary.

Brushing aside an attempt to shoot for his legs, Dom shot in himself and within seconds, scored the takedown. A few moves after that, Dom had both of his arms locked through Carver's. Brian found himself on his feet, screaming, because if Eddie had the speed and flexibility to spin out of this, well, call him Houdini.

Nope.

Dom walked around, completing the Double Arm Bar.

The ref thumped the mat.

It was over, Dom and RHS had won!

The ref had barely finished raising Dom's hand when people began pouring out of the stands on to the floor to congratulate the RHS players.

Brian let the people thunder by before hopping his way down the stairs. A part of him longed to go and join the crowd of well wishers whooping it up with the team, but he also didn't like the idea of forcing his way through the press of people. Besides, Dom was his ride home, so he was going to get time with the man of the hour no matter what.

Man of the hour. No, not really, Brian thought as he crutched his way out of the gym, Jesse at his side. Brian had taken a look at his journal the other night. A lot about Dom. A lot. More about Dom and the things they did together than stuff about Mia.

Brian liked writing down stuff in his journal. It always listened. It was a way to let off steam, to sit down and work things through. But always nagging at the back of Brian's brain was the fear of working things a little too through, he might come to a conclusion he didn't want.

(Like that he could fall in love with Dominic Toretto.)

Mia was still the coolest girlfriend ever, but Brian knew he didn't love her, and wondered if he ever would. For starters, beyond schoolwork, Dom, or whatever things they planned to do with the rest of the team, they had almost nothing to talk about. Brian admitted to himself that the reason he had not yet bought a ticket to the winter formal lay in the fact that the idea of spending an evening alone with Mia scared him shitless. What would they say? What would they do? When he thought about it, Brian realized that he had spent very little time alone with Mia.

Nor did he particularly want to.

The thought stopped him in mid swing.

Mia had many wonderful things about her, but being alone with her ... it just wasn't as natural, as easy, as _right_ as spending time with Dom.

To top everything off, he'd caught himself thinking about Dom _that_ way. A few nights ago, Brian had dreamed about Dom's hands, the way they felt, about returning the favor.

A yelp interrupted Jesse's motormouth stream of chatter, jolting Brian out of his introspective funk.

"You always play watchdog to Junior?" Johnny Tran stepped forward.

Planting himself firmly, Brian asked, "What do you want?"

Johnny looked at Jesse and said, "I want my motherfucking money."

"Yeah?" Brian snapped, "What do you want Jesse to do? Hand over his lawn mowing money?"

"Keep out of this, Blondie."

"As soon as you stop hassling a kid who's not even old enough to drive." Brian raised his voice, causing a few of the bystanders to glance their way.

"His father ripped me off! Made me and my family lose face!" Tran screamed.

"No, dude, you and yours lost money and that sucks, but if Jesse's father ripped you off, well, the problem's between you and him and _he's_ the asshole. But if you keep laying into a fourteen year old kid over this, you're a fucking asshole, too."

Tran ignored him and hissed at Jesse, "Tell your dad that I want my money, or I'm going to get really pissed."

"He doesn't have it!" Jesse shrieked in a burst of tears. "He put it in his fucking arm, okay?!"

"Fifteen thousand in his arm? That's _a lot_ of dope."

"What the fuck do you think he was busted for? He put it in his arm, and some on the horses or the tables, and god knows how much he gave to whatever skank he was banging that week. Whatever he had left was evidence against him at the trial!" Jesse's shout bordered on hysteria. "There's nothing left to give you!"

A few people paused to see what all the shouting was about. "Nothing to see here, move on," one of Tran's hangers on said.

Most kept walking, but several people hung around as tense seconds ticked by.

"Fine." Tran bit the word off. "Too bad you can't choose your parents, isn't it?" He spun on his heel and left.

Brian pulled Jesse aside, over to the gym wall, saying nothing as Jesse furiously wiped his eyes and nose on the sleeve on his sweatshirt.

A mass of damp cold air had rolled into the LA basin, and Brian did nothing, said nothing for several moments, just watched their combined breaths make frosty plumes in the air. What could he say? "Gee, Jesse, I'm sorry." As if that would help. "Look, everything will be okay." Yeah, right. What a load of horseshit.

"Have you and Nick gone to the police?" The words spilled out of Brian's mouth before he could stop them.

Jesse looked back at him, his tear wet eyes seemed huge and vulnerable in the lights. "What?"

"Like file a report or something?"

"How the hell will that help? Cops never solve problems. They only come when it's too late."

Brian blinked, taken aback by the bitterness in Jesse's tone and the harsh reality of the words. "Um, just pretend I didn't say anything," he said, as much to himself as to Jesse.

Jesse didn't reply.

Shifting from side to side on his crutches, Brian watched the people exiting the gym. They came in drips and dribbles now. He counted them, looked to see who had interesting faces, who was wearing white shoes. Anything to keep from thinking about what had just happened.

(Anything to keep his thoughts from returning to Dom, or his feelings, or how much those feelings frightened him.


	8. Chapter 8

"I'll fucking kill him!" Leon exploded when he found out about Tran. For all that Leon bitched and moaned about having to share a room with Jesse, Leon loved (and treated) the younger teen like his brother.

Dom's anger had a slow burn. "What did Tran say?" His eyes flashed hard in the night.   
Brian repeated what he remembered, and while Leon ranted in the background, Dom dragged a hand over his scalp in thought. Finally, Dom said, "It could be a threat, or it could just be Tran talking trash. I'll ask my dad what he thinks."

As Brian climbed into the Civic, he asked, "How did you all get involved with Tran, and what does he do?"

Dom groaned. "That's a long story."

Brian glared at him and said, almost coldly, "Drive slow then. 'Cause I'm mixed up in it too, now and I'd like to know what's what."

Shrugging as if to say 'whatever', Dom took a deep breath and began in a low rumble, "My dad got to know Jesse's father, Mark, from the track. He's a nice enough guy, really charming, but it's shallow." He sighed. "Charm and lies -- the survival kit of the stupid asshole.

"Y'see, Mark could have really been something --"

"But he's a user," Brian cut in. "Jesse sort of told me."

Dom nodded then continued, "So, he starts boosting all sorts of shit to pay for his bad habits, and, somehow, goes into a few deals with the Johnny Tran. Bigger time stuff: high-end car theft, jacking truck loads of DVD players, knocking over a jewelry store. And, all through this, on the side, Mark's also still pretty much taking anything that's not nailed down.

"So, like the fucking smack-head he is, he steals some shit -- rings, furs, watches -- that the Trans were planning to lavish on their family and on just about anybody they might need favors from down in Little Saigon. Mark deludes himself into thinking they can't trace it to him. He trades some of it for dope, fences it, pawns it all over the place, some of it even at the shop Vince works for.

"And, while he's on this downward spiral, Jesse comes to live with us. By this time Tran's put two and two together and starts coming around. At first he's okay. Mean, but okay. We don't have his shit, and it's pretty clear we're all hella pissed at Jesse's dad, who has pretty much fallen off the face of the earth at this point.

"And then it happens. Mark's busted and the money is gone. Tran's convinced that there's a secret stash somewhere and that Mark's found a way to tell us where its hidden."

"But there is no stash, right?" Brian asked.

"Not that Tran's ever going to see," Dom said cryptically before continuing, "And, I dumped his sister."

"What?!" Brian's voice jumped a few octaves in shock.

"Letty and I had broken up for a few weeks, and Jenny Tran is really pushy. It was okay, but believe me, Letty's got nothing on her in terms of drama. So, Jenny goes bawling away about how I just used her and dumped her as soon as I got what I wanted. **As. If.**" Dom snorted in contempt.

"So you didn't sleep with her?"

"No. I have standards."

"And now Johnny Tran comes around from time to time to lean on Jesse," Brian said.

"Yeah. Partly to convince Mark not to get any grand ideas about rolling on him, partly because he thinks he can squeeze some money out of us, and partly because he's just an asshole.

"Frankly," Dom sighed, "I'm surprised that Mark hasn't been shanked yet; I guess the Trans just don't have any people up in Boron."

"Boron?"

"Federal Pen in the ass end of nowhere. About four hours northeast of us. Jesse's dad was busted in Laughlin, NV. He was dealing to some bikers at a rally. Ended up being a federal crime and all because Mark, being Mark, couldn't keep his fucking mouth shut when they busted him."

"Wow, I mean, you're telling me all this and I don't know where to begin," Brian mused as they pulled into the drive. "All I can think is, what a shitty situation for Jesse."

"Eh, if you want some really fucked up shit, that's Leon's mom. Just drops him and the car off at our place one day about two years ago. Says she's going to visit some friends out of town for the weekend and she's long gone.

"Jesse's known since he was a little boy that his dad's not much of a man. Leon had no clue, never saw it coming."

Brian shuddered. "I thought my mother could be a cold witch sometimes, but even I don't think she could just ... drive away."

"Yeah." Dom gave a sort of sad half-smile and Brian wondered if he was thinking about how things stood with his dad. More and more Brian could see that Leon had it right. Nick Toretto wanted to be a good father, but the only thing tying him here was an ever fraying sense of duty.

"Um, see you at 6:15?"

"Sure thing," Dom said, and this time, the smile was genuine.

**~oo(0)oo~**

As soon as Brian heard the hum of the Honda's engine, he hobbled out the door.

"Hey, did you get any good footage of Leon?" Dom asked eagerly.

Brian grinned. "I got some great stuff. Short but cool. Want me to bring the camera over to your house after school?"

"Yeah." Pause. Rev. Shift. "So, when's a good time to start making the movie?"

Brian shrugged. "This weekend?"

Dom chewed his lip in thought for a moment. "Saturday's no good. I have to work the store. How's Sunday?"

"Cool. I'll let you know if anything changes."

**~oo(0)oo~**

Brian's mom made life easy by going out Christmas shopping. Brian hadn't even started his Christmas shopping. It wasn't like he had loads of money, either. Mom was cool to give him a big allowance, but she totally meant it when she said that once he spent the money, it was spent. And the cost of everything in LA made it pretty damn easy to spend $75 a week.

Getting a gift for Mia would be easy. A $50 gift card good for any store at the Galleria. Then he'd get Leon and Jesse some $10 gift cards for McDonalds or Best Buy or something. He had no idea what to get Dom. Brian wanted it to be something special, but at the same time, if he spent too much money now, no way could he afford tickets for the Winter Formal. Fifty dollars per couple. Sheesh!

"Okay, you realize this is going to take a few days to do, right?" Brian said as Dom pulled up a chair slightly behind and to the left of him, squeezing in as close as possible to get a decent view of the iMac's screen.

Breathy sigh over his shoulder. "Yeah, I figured as much. Let's go."

"Okay, first we start taking a look at all our footage and pictures and see what we want to use ...."

**~oo(0)oo~**

Two hours later they had come up with a list of pictures and clips and even talked about some ways to start putting it together, and Brian had a major, _major_ hard-on.

Dom had practically draped himself on top of Brian. Sitting on the edge of his chair, he slung his arm along the back of Brian's chair, looming over Brian's shoulder as he leaned in to point at the screen and talk. And even when Dom wasn't talking, Brian could feel the ghostly tickle of Dom's breath along the edge of his neck, not to mention every atom of that body where it draped over his left arm and shoulder, its muscles moving, tensing with excitement then relaxing. Dom's deep voice purred in his ear when he spoke. Nor could Brian escape the smell of Dom, a faint hint of Downy, a whiff of Speed Stick, and the deep base undernote that just said 'guy'.

It only got worse when Dom took his right arm off the chair back and put his hand on Brian's left shoulder and then (oh god!) rested his chin on top of it. At that point, Brian could only pay half attention to the words dribbling out of his mouth and to Dom's replies, which were in a tone of voice which seemed almost ... flirty.

(That voice in his ear, the body pressed so smoothly to his, and ... oh god.

He could kiss Dom.

_Wanted_ to kiss Dom.)

Some instinct, some vestige of self preservation mixed with fear caused Brian to blurt, "Dom, you're putting my shoulder to sleep."

"Oh, sorry 'bout that," Dom said, and backed off.

Brian gave a mental sigh of relief.

A moment later, a powerful set of hands clamped down on his shoulders and firmly, but gently, dug in.

"I do this all the time," Dom rumbled reassuringly. "My dad, Leon ...."

Brian wanted to scream and leap out of the chair. Dom had no clue just how dangerous this was.

But at the same time, three other little voices kept Brian's butt glued to the chair. The little WASP voice of propriety chittered about politeness. Another part of Brian purred in pleasure. Dom _did_ know what to do; Brian's shoulders felt great as knots of tension melted away under skilled fingers. The loudest voice, however, was the one that growled that anything that got Dom's hands on his body was a _good_ thing, and that if Dom was giving, then Brian was taking. Period.

With a low groan, Brian closed his eyes and let his head loll back against Dom's chest. Dom's hands crept forward to the tops of his shoulders, the base of his neck, his collar bones, stroking, fingers no longer kneading. Brian's eyes snapped open.

He could not mistake the look in those night-black eyes, or what that expression on Dom's face meant. Dom, for once, did not slam down the poker face. Instead, he kept the same tender yet hesitant expression on his face, and his right hand drifted lower, down to Brian's chest, caressing.

Just as hesitantly, Brian raised his hand and trailed it along Dom's forearm. Dom hitched for a second, and then his face edged closer, closer, closer, until they breathed each other's breaths and then, whisper soft, their lips brushed.

Not exactly an ideal position for a first kiss.

After a moment, Brian's chair whipped around and Dom's lips returned, less hesitantly, yet still fumbling for all their earnesty. Brian returned the kiss, giving a sort of relieved happy little half-sigh when Dom's mouth opened and oh yeah, this was _kissing_. Hot and needy and oh so good, and Brian wanted more, oh so much more.

Breaking for air, they each saw, mirrored in each other's eyes, and then each other's faces, the reality, _the magnitude_ of what they had just done, intrude.

Dom cracked first. "I've got to go." He all but flew out of the room, pounded down the stairs, and peeled out in a cloud of burnt rubber.

Brian stared blankly at the wall, fingers idly stroking along his still kiss tingly lips, perhaps subconsciously seeking to prolong the sensation.

(He. Had. Kissed. Dom.)

He. Had. Kissed. Dom.

_Oh fucky fuck fuck._

Life had just gotten a metric fuckload more complicated.

Shit.

What was he going to tell Mia? And what did this mean about him and Mia as a couple?

What was he going to say to Dom when he saw him? What did Dom think of him now?

What was Mom going to say about the skid marks in her drive?

Brian stared blankly at his poster of David Beckham for quite some time. Beckham in mid stride, about to kick the ball. Plant foot on the ground, kicking foot swung back. Beckham's eyes almost crossed as he focused on the ball. His hair blown back from the wind in his face.

The instant. Frozen.

Brian remembered when his life had seemed as simple as that instant. School. Soccer. Scholarship. Degree. Job. He pulled the composition book out of his desk and stared at the neat college rule pages. They seemed to mock him. So neat. So orderly. So clean and predictable. So completely and utterly unlike his incredibly messed up, fucked up life.

Brian picked up a pen and began jotting down just about anything that tumbled through his mind. He heard his mom's car in the drive. He put the pen down and squared up to face what he knew would come next.

**~oo(0)oo~**

He spent Monday unable to meet Mia's eyes.

At lunch, the food tasted like sand in his mouth. The few times he mustered the courage to flick his eyes up to meet Dom's, he found a stony blankness in them.

Fuck a doodle doo.

He headed down to the soccer field. Today was the first day that Coach Prince would let him do any kind of work with the team. Granted, no field time, just some basic stretching and helping with the equipment.

Just before the rest of the team took the field for scrimmage, Hector came up and asked, "Que pasa, snowman?"

"I think I'm about to break up with my girlfriend," Brian blurted.

"You a crazy man," Hector said.

Brian groaned, buried his head in his hands and said, "Tell me about it."

After practice he went straight home. When dinner time came, he ate what showed up on the table before him without complaint or comment, went to his room, attempted homework, and when bedtime came, Brian spent a long time looking up at the ceiling until somehow it was morning again.

In Biology, he managed to meet Mia's eyes a little bit, and even flash her a bit of a smile when she asked what was wrong.

The shit hit the fan at lunch.

Mia stormed up to the table, tears in her eyes, and slapped him. Brian sat frozen in shock, hand raised to his stinging cheek as she shouted at him for being such a damn coward, and that if he wanted to break up with her, she shouldn't have to hear about it from somebody else.

By the time Brian collected his thoughts enough to open his mouth and try to explain what he had really said to Hector -- oh, _fuck_ him -- Mia had stormed off again. In the dead silence that followed, Brian felt the weight of Dom's, Vince's, and Leon's stares. "Look," he said, "There's **a lot** more to this story that you all don't know."

"Oh, I'm all ears," Vince said, a real edge to his voice.

"It's not what you think, " Brian said, standing up.

"What is it then?" Leon asked, not as nastily as Vince, but clearly ready to go to bat and get the jerk who had done Mia wrong.

"It's ... complicated. And," Brian drew in a deep breath, "it's gossip. It's trash talk. Somebody heard something out of context and now everybody's got the wrong idea." Brian's eyes flicked over to Dom, desperately seeking some help.

"So, educ--"

Dom cut Vince off. "Leave it."

Vince nearly broke his neck, he turned his head back around so fast. Leon also goggled in shock.

"B- But--" Leon sputtered.

"I. Said. Leave. It." Dom bit off every word. "It's not your mess to sort out."

Vince and Leon fell into a sullen silence. Their eyes glittered at him with barely restrained malice.

"Thanks, man," Brian said to Dom.

But in the minutes that followed none of them, not even Dom, would look him in the eye.

"Okay ... then." Brian stood and crutched away.

The rest of the week and short week after sucked. Brian blew up at Hector, which made things a little bumpy with the rest of the soccer team. Not a good thing considering they needed to have their minds on the upcoming playoff game. Nobody on Team Toretto would give him the time of day. Mom did the 'honey, what's wrong?' thing, so he told her the part of the truth she could wrap her brain around: that because of some gossip at school Mia broke up with him.

She tried to be sympathetic and take his side, but Brian got the distinct impression that his mother felt somewhat relieved that things had not worked out with Mia.

Brian opened up the movie of Leon and Leon's car he had started to edit together and thought about deleting it.

He fucking missed Dom and the rest of the team something awful. Christmas break without them would suck.

He had no one to talk to, so he scribbled page after page in his journal.

The only thing that made him feel a tiny bit less sad and pissed off was the sympathy he got from a few girls. Of course, Brian had to wonder if it was genuine or if they were just fishing to be his rebound date to the Winter Formal.

Final exams flew by in a blur. He hoped he didn't do too badly on them.


	9. Chapter 9

Christmas Morning 3:30am. The sound of pebbles plinking against his window woke Brian out of a fitful slumber. Reluctantly, he opened it.

Dom. "Let's go run Mulholland," Pause. "We should talk."

After a moment's hesitation, Brian threw on a sweatshirt, a pair of socks, and his slippers, then trundled out of the house still in his pajama bottoms. Dom raised an eyebrow at the red plaid flannel. Brian shrugged. "Hey," he said, "I'm just going straight back to bed after all is said and done, might as well stay comfy."

The night was bitter cold, right around freezing, making Brian grateful for the cocooning warmth of the Civic. Dom kept the radio low and didn't say a word as they zoomed down the highway and up the crest of the ridge.

Glancing over several times during the drive, Brian could see that Dom had his face set in an inscrutable mask. Try as he might, Brian could not glean a clue about Dom's mood or motives. For all he knew, he could end up the recipient of a shitkicking beatdown (but that didn't seem likely) or he and Dom have their badly needed talk and figure a few things out. Brian didn't think he could salvage his relationship with Mia, didn't want to really; he wanted more than anything to get right with Dom.

Dom pulled the car into a turn-out. Once again, greater LA metro spread out before them in a glittering sheet of lights, the cold crispness of the air making it seem impossibly close, even through the windshield.

Dom clenched the wheel, knuckles white, eyes front, saying nothing; only the intensity of the manner in which his hands gripped and released, gripped and released betrayed any emotion. Finally, he reached over and switched off the stereo.

At last, the moment of truth.

Brian drew a deep breath and began, "Dom, it was never my intention to dump Mia that way. I mean, I was probably going to break up with her, but I'd never, ever, be that shitty to her. It's just --"

"Oh, shut up." Dom reached out, grabbed a fistful of Brian's hair, and drew him close, kissing him.

And everything Brian had meant to say vanished as he hungrily gave in.

**~oo(0)oo~**

**=Interlude: Final Exam=**

So. He did it. Just reached out and kissed Brian. 'Cause if they kept talking, he might go all chicken shit again, or they might talk all around the subject and that would solve nothing. Dom needed to know. Was that afternoon in Brian's room a one-off, or did Brian really dig him?

Brian just _melted_ into him. It was everything Dom had ever hoped for. The hot wetness of Brian's mouth, the --ohgod-- longed for taste of Brian O'Conner. He reached across with his other hand, pivoting as much as he could in the seat, and, finding the bottom of Brian's sweatshirt, Dom worked his hand up and under both sweatshirt and pajama top, touching the body he had dreamed about, beat off just thinking about, more times than he cared to count. Brian didn't stop him, just unbuckled his seat belt and leaned in, reaching across and running his hand up and down Dom's thigh, causing Dom's dick to jerk wildly in response.

Finally, hands under each other's clothes about as far as the cramped confines of the front seats would let them, Dom forced himself to stop kissing and said, "Back seat."

"Yeah," Brian groaned huskily, his lips lush and kiss swollen, his blue eyes gone all pupil, looking so hot and fuckable that Dom had to stop himself from groaning because he wanted it so bad.

And like they had the same mind, they opened the doors and, ratcheting the front seats as far forward as they would go, all but dived into the backseat, slamming the doors before the cold could really get them.

With a noise like a growl, Dom pulled Brian's body tightly to him. Too tight, because Brian grunted a bit, and Dom reluctantly made himself ease off. He was finally getting what he had longed for all semester and the thought of letting go, getting less Brian, just felt so wrong.

Lightly, hand shaking with nerves, Dom brushed his hand down the front of Brian's pajama bottoms as they kissed, fingers dancing across the hot hardness barely contained by the soft flannel. Brian responded by gasping and shoving his hips into Dom's touch. A moment later, Brian's hand found the front of Dom's jeans and stroked him in reply.

The part of Dom's brain that could still think shouted and screamed and danced and sang, delighted that _it_ was finally happening: that he would finally touch and be touched all the ways he had dreamed of since he was old enough to know what sex was, that he had this wonderful and hot guy all eager for him; that denim wasn't nearly as thick as it seemed; that Brian tasted every bit as good as he smelled; that being in love felt so good it was a wonder his heart didn't burst.

Dom shifted back in the seat and popped the buttons on his fly, guiding Brian's hand where he wanted it --needed it -- to go. He couldn't contain the shudder when Brian's warm, strong hand finally made contact with bare flesh. With a shaking hand, Dom reached for the flap on Brian's pajamas, so jittery that he actually needed an assist to get Brian's cock out.

His mind began to fry as Brian's fingers matched his movement for movement, stroke for stroke. Dom had no words to describe the sensation of having a hand not his own on cock, fingers slip sliding, with no idea of where they would go next, or what new thing, new sensation they would cause. And, well, Brian's dick was just so _hot_ in his hand and Dom could feel it throb slightly in time with Brian's pulse, almost like it was Brian's beating heart he cradled and caressed, and how mindblowingly incredible such a simple thing was, a hand on a dick, to cause these almost magical feelings, eye blurring waves of goodness to crash through a body.

Faster and faster, hands stroked and kisses took on a desperate, devouring quality, and Dom finally tore his mouth from Brian's, kissed and nipped his way down Brian's jaw line, to that place where neck met face, sucking, tasting, vibing on the way that Brian groaned and twitched in response, the way his cock spasmed and gave a little spurt of pre-come, laughing a bit on the inside that Brian's entire vocabulary could be reduced to an endless stream of ohgods, like thats, and oh Doms.

But Dom didn't have long to laugh, because a few strokes later his own breath left his body in an endless hitching groan and he barely had time to gasp out an "Oh Jesus! Brian!" as the orgasm slammed into him and the world exploded in a technicolor cascade.

Dom came to sagged bonelessly against Brian, eyes closed, breath coming in shuddery gasps, nostrils filled with the scent of Brian and sweat and sex, his hand full of sticky, cooling come. And ... oh shit. No Kleenex.

He straightened up a bit, struggling for a touch of control over his over his bliss slack body, and Brian just had this incredibly goofy-happy grin on his face, and they both started giggling as Brian held up his own sticky, come-covered hand.

"I guess we really didn't think this through," Brian said.

"Um, no, I guess not." Dom laughed back.

In the end they resorted to using Brian's sweatshirt. Dom promised to crank the heat so he wouldn't freeze on the way home.

Pulling Brian back into his arms, Dom leaned back as much as he could and wished he never had to move again. He drank in the smells of their bodies, the smell of sweat, and skin, and come, and wondered how anybody could ever describe a room as reeking of sex. How could anybody think these ... primal ... smells were bad? Taking a deep, shuddery breath, Dom grabbed every ounce of courage he could find and choked out, "I love you Brian. I think I've been in love with you since I've seen you. And you were such a nice guy, a guy who deserved to have Mia, and that just made me love you more, fucked up as it is."

"I don't quite know what to say," Brian replied. Then he pulled away and said in a solemn voice, "I'm just glad you're not going to beat the shit out of me."

Dom carded his fingers through Brian's hair. "Never that, Brian, never that," he murmured, kissing his temple.

**~oo(0)oo~**

Brian envied how Dom seemed to have a more simple take on what had happened here, or, maybe he just had not thought things all the way through yet, or maybe he just thought that love was enough. Because, as happy as Brian was about what had just happened with Dom, no matter how much he wanted it, guilt about Mia still nagged at him. No matter what happened, somebody was going to end up incredibly hurt by all of this.

Finally, head pillowed against Dom's shoulder, he murmured, "Dom, we need to talk."

Dom released him and sighed. "I know I'm supposed to feel bad about this, like I've backstabbed Mia and that I should hate you for cheating on her, but I don't, Brian. I can't."

"Well, what about this?" Brian gestured to indicate the two of them. "What about us?"

"Yes?" But Dom's bravado was thin.

"You … you mean you're --"

Bitterness seared Dom's reply, "I know what I am, Brian. I've known it for a long time."

_Oh._

Brian felt his teeth click together as he snapped his mouth shut. He turned around to face the front of the car and leaned up against the front seat, burying his head in his arms. "Yeah, well, maybe I don't know what I am, Dom. Maybe I'm still wrapping my brain around the idea."

"That you like guys, or me?"

Brian chuckled ruefully. "Both. Sort of. It's not like I don't like girls, that I was faking it all with Mia. I still think she's the hottest girl in school." He let out a gusty breath. "It's not like I haven't fooled around with a guy before, but that's all it was, fooling around. It's not like there were real feelings involved. This just makes it all incredibly fucking complicated."

"So," Dom said hesitantly, "is this a yes?"

"A yes to what, Dom?"

Dom looked at him, naked emotion in his eyes. "To guys. To me. To us."

_Oh hell_.

Because, what did he really feel for Dom? Brian had spent so much time burying, avoiding, and denying, he struggled to find a good place to start. Did he really think he was prepared to deal with what being with Dom meant, with what it could mean, with what people would think when they found out?

And then, memories assaulted him, memories of the best times spent with Dom: his smile, his confidence, his camaraderie. What it felt like to work with him. What Dom made Brian feel -- and not just the mindblowingly intense sex they had just had -- but how Brian felt so incredibly _whole_ when he and Dom spent time together.

Fidgeting nervously, Brian turned to Dom and said, "I guess so. I mean, yes. God, this is so fucked, but yes."

Sunrises and supernovas had nothing on the smile Dom gave him then.

Best Christmas present, ever.

And those little voices of guilt and analyzing and common sense got told to shut the fuck up as the car wound its way off the ridge top. He and Dom would work, or they wouldn't, and seeing if they did or not wasn't wrong. Nothing could be more right.

Turning to Dom, Brian said, "Que sera, sera, right?"

Dom squeezed his hand and replied, "My mother loved that song. Absolutely."


End file.
